Leon Trotskii Collected Writings 1935 1936 PDF

UlRITinGS OF
LE0I1
IROTSKV
[1935-36]
IRITlnG5 OF
LEon TROTSHV
[1935-3&]
Writings of Leon Trotsky is a collection,
in twelve volumes, of pamphlets, articles,

-
letters, and interviews written during
Trotsky's third and final exile (1929-40).
They include many articles translated into
English for the first time. They do not
include the books and pamphlets from
this period that are permanently in print,
nor most of the unpublished material in
the Trotsky Archives at Harvard Uni
versity Library. Five of the volumes cover
Trotsky's residence in Turkey (1929,
1930, 1930-31, 1932, 1932-33); two in
France (1933-34, 1934-35); one in Nor
way (1935-36); and four in Mexico (1936-
37, 1937-38, 1938-39, 1939-40).

WRITlnliS
LEOD
TROTSHV
[1935-3Ii]
PATHFINDER PRESS, INC.

NEW YORK
This volume is dedicated to
the memory of ELOISE BOOTH (1912-1952)
Copyright 1970 and 1977 by Pathfinder Press, Inc.

All rights res erved
Library of Congress Catalog C ard Number 73-80226
ISBN 87348-501-7 (cloth edition)
ISBN 87348-502-5 (paper edition)
Manufactured in the United States of America
E dited by Naomi Allen and George Breitman
First edition, 1970

Second edition, 1977
Pathfinder Press, Inc.

410 VVest Street
New York, N.Y. 10014
CONTENTS
Preface 11
Chronology 16
Open Letter for the Fourth International
(Spring 1935) 19
Luxemburg and the Fourth International
(June 24, 1935) 29
* The SAP and the Open Letter (July 2, 1935) 33
* For a Special Information Service (J uly 2, 1935) 37
* " World Party of Social Revolution" (July 14, 1935) 39
* The Italo-Ethiopian Conflict
(Published July 17, 1935) 41
* For Defense of Soviet Revolutionaries (July 17, 1935) 42
Perspectives in Poland (July 18, 1935) 44
To Young Communists and Socialists Who Wish to Think
(July 22, 1935) 49
A Report in Arbeiderbladet (Published July 26, 1935) 53
Who Defends Russia? Who Helps Hitler?
1
Oehlerism and the French Experience (August 11, 1935) 65
A Cancer in the Workers Party (A ugust 12, 1935) 70
* Preface to P.J. Schmidt's Article on Holland
(August 12, 1935) 74
* An Appeal to Oehlerite Comrades (A ugust 13, 1935) 77
* Letter to the German Commission (A ugust 19, 1935) 79
The Comintern's Liquidation Congress (August 23, 1935) 84
* To the Editors of Action Socialiste Revolutionnaire
(A ugust 23, 1935) 95
A Case for a Labor Jury (A ugust 29, 1935) 99
* Published here in English for the first time.

An Appeal (Published September 1935) 105
How History and Biography Are Written
(Published September 1935) 107
* Letter to the Emigre C ommittee of the IKD
(September 2, 1935) 112
The Terror of Bureaucratic Self-Preservation
(September 6, 1935) 115
The Revolutionary Internationalists Need Our Help!
(September 7, 1935) 122
The Stalinist Turn (September 7, 1935) 125
Russia and the World Proletariat (September 14, 1935) 130
The ILP and the Fourth International
(September 18, 1935) 134
* For Practical Steps Toward Rapprochement
(October 11, 1935) 151
S ectarianism, Centrism , and the Fourth International
(Octo ber 22, 1935) 152
Romain Rolland E xecutes an Assignment
(October 31, 1935) 161
Lessons of October (No vember 4, 1935) 166
How Did Stalin Defeat the Opposition?
(No vember 12, 1935) 171
A Venerable Smerdyakov (November 1935) 180
Two Statements on the Cannon-Shachtman Letter
*
A Brief Remark (November 1935) 182
An Obvious E rror (No vember 13, 1935) 182
* Factions and the Fourth International (1935) 184
* An Answer to Comrades in Anvers (No vember 1935) 190
Tactical Questions and Splits (No vember 18, 1935) 193
Once Again the I LP (No vember 1935) 197
Advice on Canadian Farmers (No vember 1935) 209
* Remarks in Passing (December 8, 1935) 212
* On the Postcard Amalgam (December 15, 1935) 217
Request for a Month's Leave of Absence
(December 2 7, 1935) 220
* For a Lucid Explanation (December 30, 1935) 221
* D evelopments in the USSR (Decem ber 31, 1935) 222
The Class Nature of the Soviet State (January 1, 1936) 223
* Foreign Communists in Danger (January 2, 1936) 226
Notes of a Journalist (January 10, 1936) 228
On the Soviet Section of the Fourth International
(January 11, 1936) 235
* Bourgeois Democracy and the Fight Against Fascism
(January 13, 1936) 242
Stalin 's Revolutionary Prisoners (January 15, 1936) 245
* Questions of a British Group (January 15, 1936) 250
For Entry in the U . S .
Letter to Cannon a n d Shachtman (January 24, 1936) 252
* Letter to AJ. Muste (January 24, 1936) 253
* Letter to Jack Weber (January 24, 1936) 253
Stalin Frame-Up Mill at Work (January 30, 1936) 254
* A Crisis in the Workers Party (Fe bruary 6, 1936) 257
* Letter to AJ. Muste (February 8, 1936) 262
Statement to Associated Press (Fe bruary 8, 1936) 263
* Some Advice to a British Group (March 7, 1936) 264
* How to Work in the SP (March 9, 1936) 267
The Stalin-Howard Interview (March 18, 1936) 270
"The Point of No Return" (Published April 1936) 278
Once Again on the S o viet Section
(Pu blished April 1936) 281
An Honest Book (March 21, 1936) 283
The Plan to Exterminate the Bolshevik-Leninists
(March 25, 1936) 285
* Suggestions for the Belgian Section (March 27, 1936) 287
Open Letter to a British Comrade (April 3, 1936) 293
* A Good Omen for Joint Work in Britain (April 9, 1936) 298
The New Constitution of the USSR (April 16, 1936) 300
In the Columns of Pravda (Pu blished May 1936) 314
On Dictators and the H eights of Oslo (April 22, 1936) 317
* How to Win the Socialist Youth (April 27, 1936) 321
Political Persecution in the USSR (May 22, 1936) 324
The Spiciest Dishes Are Still to Come
(Pu blished May 1936) 329
On Comrade Ciliga's Articles (June 3, 1936) 331
The New Revolutionary Upsurge and the Tasks of the
Fourth International (July 1936) 332
To the Public Opinion of the Workers of the Whole
World (Ju ly 4, 1936) 341
How the Workers in Austria Should Fight Hitler
(Pu blished July 1936) 345
* For C alm and Obj ective Work (July 6, 1936) 351
The Fourth International and the Soviet Union
(July 8, 1936) 354
* For a Common Goal in Britain (July 13, 1936) 361
The Dutch Section and the International
(July 15-16, 1936) 362
Interview on British Problems (August 1936) 377
Let Us Know the Facts (August 15, 1936) 383
* Open Letter to the Oslo Chief of Police
(August 19, 1936) 386
Worse Than Dreyfus and Reichstag Cases
(August 19, 1936) 389
* Who Is V. Olberg? (August 20, 1936) 390
*Individual Terror and Mass Terror (August 20, 1936) 392
A Revolutionary, Not a Terrorist (August 21, 1936) 395
*A Miniature Edition of the Moscow Indictment
(August 21, 1936) 400
*A Revealing Episode (August 22, 1936) 401
*Statement on the Trial (August 23, 1936) 403
*Tomsky's Suicide (August 23, 1936) 406
*Some Facts for the Prague Committee (August 23, 1936) 407
*Stalin Is Not E verything (August 23, 1936) 410
Interview in News Chronicle (August 24, 1936) 413
*An Answer to Mr. S charffenberg (August 24, 1936) 417
*The D eath Sentences (August 24, 1936) 419
*Regular Trial Demanded (August 25, 1936) 421
A Letter to Trygve Lie (August 2 6, 1936) 422
*Trials Without End (A ugust 27, 1936) 425
* Letter to Mr. Puntervold (September 15, 1936) 427
*Echoes of a Belgian Witch-hunt (September 23, 1936) 432
* Letters to an Attorney (Septem ber- O ctober 1936) 434
* Comments on Defense Efforts (October 3, 1936) 438
*The S afety of the Archives (Octo ber 10, 1936) 440
*Letter to the IFTU (October 22, 1936) 441
* Letter to the League of Nations (October 22, 1936) 443
* Letters to an Attorney (late October 1936) 444
*Remarks About the Arbeiderbladet Interview
(No vember 10, 1936) 445
* On the GPU's Theft of Archives (No vember 10, 1936) 447
*Letters to an Attorney (November 1936) 448
* Letter to the League for the Rights of Man
(Pu blished Novem ber 30, 1936) 453
*Letters to an Attorney (Decem ber 1936) 454
In Closed Court (December 11, 1936) 455
* For the Earliest Possible Departure from Norway
(December 16, 1936) 486
*Valuable Time Is Being Lost (Decem ber 17, 1936) 488
Shame! (December 18, 1936) 489
*A Formal Declaration (December 18, 1936) 501
Last Letter from E urope (Decem ber 18, 1936) 502
Notes and Acknowledgments 503
Index 560
Other Writings of 1935-36 575
Books and Pamphlets by Leon Trotsky 576
Leon Trotsky in Norway.
PREFACE
The third country in which Leon Trotsky lived during his last
exile (1929-40) was Norway. Deported from the Soviet Union in
1929, he lived in Turkey until 1933, when the French government
granted him asylum. Less than a year later, it ordered him to
leave, but because no country would accept him, this order could
not be enforced until June 1935, when the newly installed
Norwegian labor government cons ented to admit him. He
remained in Norway until December 1936, when the same
government had him put on a tanker bound for Mexico. This
collection of p amphlets, articles, letters, and discussions, which
are not otherwise available in books or p amphlets permanently in
print, covers Trotsky's eighteen-month stay in Norway; this
second edition, with approximately twice as many articles as the
first, contains a great deal of material here published in English
for the first time, and much that has never before been published
in any language.
Trotsky's m ain concern while he was in Norway was the
struggle to form the Fourth International, which he and his
comrades had undertaken in 1933, after the criminal failure of the
Communist International to block the Nazi assumption of power
in Germany had convinced them to abandon their effort to reform
the Comintern . During these months in Norway Trotsky wrote
The Revolution Betrayed (Pathfinder Press, 1972)-a profound
analysis of the degeneration of the Soviet Union under Stalinism,
which he also viewed as a contribution to the building of the
Fourth International. The contents of the present volume indicate
how much of his attention and thought was focused on the
problems of the projected new International and its national
sections at that time, when the maj or powers were beginning to
reorganize themselves for World W ar II. Fascist Italy was
preparing to invade Ethiopia when Trotsky arrived in Norway,
and did so a few months l ater. In July 1936 the Spanish fascists
under Franco launched a civil war that Hitler and Mussolini
would utilize as a testing ground for new weapons and tactics.
In its own way, the Soviet bureaucracy also began to prepare
for the coming war. One form this took was the abandonment of
11
12 Writings of Leon Trotsky (1935-36)
the ultraleft policies proclaimed and practiced by the Stalinized

Communist International from 1928 to 1934, policies that had
facilitated Hitler's victory_ In those years, called the "third
period," the parties of the Comintern had declared that revolution
was imminent everywhere, and had forbidden collaboration or
united front activity with other working class parties or
tendencies, which were dubbed "social fascists_ "
The n e w Stalinist policy began to take public shape i n the
spring of 1935, while Trotsky was still in France, when Stalin
signed a pact with imperialist France and announced that he
"understands and fully approves" French rearmament_ The new
policy was declared universally applicable at the seventh and
final world congress of the Comintern, held in Moscow in August
1935, and had two m aj or themes: the "People's Front" and
"collective security. " Now Stalinists everywhere were ordered to
collaborate not only with the working class forces previously
called social fascists (except the "Trotskyists" ) , but also with
"progressive" and "democratic" capitalists and their p arties, and,
on the international scene, to support the democratic imperialist
governments in their military and diplomatic preparations for
war against the fascist governments. As a result of this policy
which was pursued until 1939, when Hitler signed a pact with
Stalin-the opportunities for social revolution that arose in
France and Spain in 1936 were lost or deliberately stifled, and the
working class was politically disarmed at the outbreak of the
war.
Trotsky met this sharp rightward move of the Stalinists by
redoubling his efforts to build a new worldwide Leninist
organization. The first draft of his Open Letter for the Fourth
International, which begins this volume, was written shortly
before he left France. It was designed to speed up and if possible
complete the international regroupment of genuinely revolution
ary forces that had begun in 1933, when the International Left
Opposition became the International Communist League. In
1933-35 the ICL sought to link itself with leftward-moving forces
in various centrist organizations. Fusions of ICL sections with
such elements in the United States and Holland led to the
formation of the Workers Party of the United States (1934) and
the Revolutionary Socialist Workers Party of Holland (1935), both
of which signed the Open Letter. In 1934 the ICL's French section
entered the Socialist P arty and its youth movement in order to
win over their revolutionary members. The French SP leaders
were preparing to expel the partisans of the Fourth International
when Trotsky reached Norway. The members of the Workers
Preface 13
Party of the U.S. would enter the American Socialist P arty in

1936.
The tactics used to remove organizational obstacles in the path
of centrist forces moving to the left provoked serious resistance,
factional strife, and in some cases splits on the part of sectarians
in the IC L who found it difficult to distinguish between principles
and tactics or who had become comfortable in their isolation. A
large p art of this volume is devoted to these and other problems
of party-building, and to centrism, factionalism, sectarianism,
and opportunism in Belgium , Britain, Holland, and the United
States.
In addition, the experience inside the Socialist parties, while
considerably enlarging the cadres for the Fourth International,
coincided with and in some cases encouraged the development of
opportunistic tendencies ready to sacrifice principles for the sake
of tactical m aneuvers. This dangerous development led to a split
in the French section after its members h a d been expelled from
the Socialist Party toward the end of 1935. The editors had hoped
to include this important episode in this volume, but were
prevented from doing so by the large amount of material that has
come to light, on the one hand, and the already excessive size of
this volume, on the other. Trotsky's writings on the split and its
consequences in France will be found in a separate volume, The
Crisis in the F rench Section (1935-36). Several articles on this
subject that were in the first edition of Writings 35-36 have been
omitted from the second edition and will be included in that
volume.
Although the response to the Open Letter for the Fourth
International was limited , Trotsky believed that those who
agreed with its line should move promptly to create a new
International, and that was what he proposed to the First
International C onference for the Fourth International, sponsored
by the I C L and held in July 1936. But the delegates to that
conference thought such a m o ve premature, and voted instead to
form the Movement for the Fourth International; the founding
conference of the new organization would not be held for two
more years. The present volume contains three documents written
by Trotsky and adopted by the 1936 conference.
While the Soviet bureaucracy was conciliating democratic
imperialists abroad and adopting a new constitution at home, it
stepped up its persecution, imprisonment, and murder of
revolutionaries and oppositionists inside the Soviet Union. The
actual dimensions of this repression began to emerge m ore
clearly when two revolutionaries escaped in 1935 to describe the
14 Writings of Leon Trotsky (1 935-36)
conditions that prevailed in the prisons, camps, and places of

exile that were home to tens of thousands of Soviet oppositionists_
Trotsky was untiring in his work of publicizing the repression
and appealing for international support and aid for the victims of
Stalin's prisons and concentration camps_
The repression reached a new level in August 1936, when the
Moscow "confession" trial of sixteen defendants, headed by the
Old Bolsheviks Zinoviev and Kamenev, startled the world.
Trotsky, the chief target of the trial, began at once to expose it as
the worst frame-up in history, but he was quickly silenced and
interned by the Norwegian government, acting under pressure
from Moscow. The last part of this volume includes Trotsky's
statements on the trial, including his summary of the dramatic
testimony he gave in a closed Norwegian courtroom before he
and his companion, Natalia Sedova, were shipped off to Mexico.
Until the Moscow trial claimed exclusive use of his time,
Trotsky wrote on a great diversity of subjects, included in this
volume: the relation of factions to a political party; terrorism; the
uses of the general strike; the role of the capitalist state in the
fight against fascism; the Seventh World Congress of the
Comintern; whether Marxists should defend religious freedom in
Nazi Germany; the new Soviet constitution; Rosa Luxemburg;
People's Frontism; and more.
The second edition of this volume differs from the first in the
following ways:
1. It is much larger. Of the 132 selections in this edition, 70 are
published here in English for the first time; they are indicated by
an asterisk in the table of contents. This edition does not include
the long essay "Edouard Bernot, Politician of the Golden Mean,"
which has been transferred to Trotsky's Portraits, Political and
Personal (Pathfinder Press, 1977). "Before the Second Stage" has
been transferred to Leon Trotsky on France. "The Expulsion of
the French Youth," '' 'Labels' and 'Numbers,'" "After the Toulon
Events," "Introduction to Fred Zeller's Pamphlet," "For Commit
tees of Action, Not the People's Front," "What Is a 'Mass
Paper'?" and "Lessons of the SFIO Entry" have been transferred
to The Crisis of the French Section (1 935-36). "Ready to Face
Norwegian Court," which contained nothing by Trotsky, has
been dropped. "In 'Socialist' Norway," which Trotsky wrote as a
retrospective summary of his sojourn in Norway, has been moved
to Writings 3 6-37.
2. The first edition was divided into nine sections by theme. All
the articles in the second edition are arranged in chronological
order, except for certain letters about the Moscow trial sent to
Preface 15
Trotsky's French lawyer, which are grouped together for the

convenience of readers and editors.
3. Some dates mistakenly given articles in the first edition
have been corrected here, and articles that were incomplete
because the full text was not available are here presented in their
entirety.
All of the articles in this volume were written at Honefoss, a
town about thirty miles north of Oslo, where Trotsky lived in the
home of a Labor Party member of the Norwegian parliament; in a
hospital in Oslo, where he stayed for six weeks toward the end of
1935; at Opdagelseschef, a small island where he was vacation
ing when news of the Moscow trial reached him; and at Sundby,
where he was interned for three and a half months before being
deported to Mexico. Many of these articles were signed by pen
names or were unsigned when first published, usually for security
reasons; this explains why in certain places Trotsky refers to
himself in the third person. The date preceding each selection
indicates when it was completed; if that is not known, the date
when it was first published is given. Translations originally
made in the 1930s and 1940s have been revised to correct obvious
errors and to achieve uniformity in spelling of names, punctua
tion, style, etc. Acknowledgments about the articles and transla
tions, and explanatory material about the persons and events
mentioned in them, will be found in the section entitled "Notes
and Acknowledgments." A list of Trotsky's 1935-36 writings not
included in this volume because they are in print and available
elsewhere will be found in the section entitled "Other Writings of
1935-36."
For expansion of this edition and improvements in its contents,
special thanks are due the Harvard College Library, for its
permission to examine and use material in the "open" section of
the Trotsky Archives at Harvard; the Library of Social History in
New York, for its permission to examine and use material in the
archives of the late James P. Cannon; the late Kenth-Ake
Andersson, for locating and making available copies of articles
published in the Scandinavian press; Albert Glotzer, for provid
ing copies of letters by Trotsky from his personal archives; John
Archer, for his elucidation of some features in the history of
British Trotskyism; Jean van Heijenoort, Herman Pieterson, and
Dick Fidler, for assistance with various points requiring annota
tion; and Louis Sinclair, for the help afforded by his Leon
Trotsky: A Bibliography (Hoover Institution Press, 1972).
The Editors
September 1976
CHRONOLOGY
-1935-
Spring-Trotsky writes Open Letter for the Fourth International.

June 18-Trotsky arrives in Norway.
July 14-People's Front holds enormous demonstration in Paris.
July 30-Expulsion of French Trotskyists from leadership of
Socialist Youth begins at Lille congress.
July 25-August 20-Comintern holds its seventh and final world
congress, adopting People's Front line. Three days later,
Trotsky begins analysis ("The Comintern's Liquidation Con
gress").
August-September-French SP leadership excommunicates
Trotskyists' paper, La Verite, and begins expulsions of adult
Trotskyists.
September-Biulleten Oppozitsii publishes letter by Soviet emigre
Tarov shedding new light on conditions among Soviet political
prisoners.
September I9-Trotsky enters hospital in Oslo for six weeks.
October 3-Italian army invades Ethiopia.
Autumn-Tories win British general elections.
November-Trotsky is interviewed on British political problems.
December 6-French Trotskyists expel faction led by R.
. Molinier
for violation of discipline.
-1936-
January 24-Trotsky approves proposal for U.S. Trotskyists to

enter SP.
February I6-Electoral victory of Spanish People's Front.
March I-Convention of Workers Party of U.S. authorizes entry
into SP.
March 7-Nazi remilitarization of Rhineland becomes official.
April-Biulleten Oppozitsii publishes Ciliga's articles on Soviet
political prisoners.
April 26-May 3-Electoral victory of French People's Front.
16
Chronology 17
May 26-Massive strike wave begins in France.

June 4-French People's Front government is formed with Blum
as premier.
June 5-Pravda announces Central Committee has adopted new,
"democratic" Soviet constitution.
June 12-French police seize first number of Lutte ouvriere, paper
of the POI, new Trotskyist party.
June 28-July 5-A.J. Muste visits Trotsky in Norway.
July 17-Franco's fascist uprising opens Spanish Civil War.
July 29-31-First International Conference for the Fourth
International held in "Geneva" (actually, Paris).
August-Blum government adopts policy of "nonintervention" in
Spain.
August 4-Trotsky finishes manuscript of Re volution Betrayed.
Norwegian Nazis burglarize his home.
August 19-24-First big Moscow show trial ends with death
sentences for sixteen defendants.
August 26-Trotsky refuses to sign statement demanded by
Norwegian government.
August 28-Trotsky is placed under house arrest.
September 2-Trotsky is transferred to Sundby, where he is held
virtually incommunicado.
October-Trotsky's Norwegian lawyer initiates suit for slander
against Stalinist and fascist papers but Norwegian government
passes special decrees to prevent any court action by Trotsky.
October-Trotskyists expelled from Belgian Labor Party estab
lish PSR.
November 7-GPU steals Trotsky's archives from Paris institute.
November ll-Another special edict passed by Norwegian gov
ernment prevents Trotsky from using any foreign tribunal to
seek a hearing.
December ll-Trotsky testifies for four hours at trial of his
Norwegian fascist attackers.
December 19-Trotsky is forcibly put aboard a tanker bound for
Mexico.
Natalia Sedova (left) and Leon Trotsky (second from right) leave the ship that
brought them to Norway, June 18, 1935.
OPEN LETTER
FOR THE FOURTH INTERNATIONAL!
To All Revolutionary Working Class

Organizations and Groups
Spring 1 9 3 5
Hitler's assumption o f power, which did not meet with the

slightest resistance on the part of the two "mighty" working class
parties-one of them, moreover, basing itself upon the USSR
has decisively exposed the internal putrefaction of the Second
and Third Internationals.2 In August 1933, four organizations
formulated for the first time in a programmatic document the
new historic task: the creation of the Fourth International.3 The
events that have transpired since that time have been irrefutable
confirmation that there is no other road.
The annihilation of the Austrian proletariat4 has demonstrated
that victory cannot be gained by issuing a last-minute call for
insurrection to the masses, disoriented and drained by
opportunism-after the party had been driven into a blind alley.
It is necessary to prepare systematically for victory by means of
revolutionary policies in every sphere of the working class
movement.
The very same lesson immutably flows from the annihilation of
the Spanish proletariat.5 Under all conditions, especially during a
revolution, it is impermissible to turn one's back upon the toilers
for the sake of a bloc with the bourgeoisie. It is impossible to
expect and demand that the duped and disillusioned masses will
fly to take up arms upon the belated call of a party in which they
have lost confidence. The proletarian revolution is not improvised
by the orders of a bankrupt leadership. The revolution must be
prepared through incessant and irreconcilable class struggle,
which gains for the leadership the unshakable confidence of the
party, fuses the vanguard with the entire class, and transforms
19
the proletariat into the leader of all the exploited in the city and
countryside.
Following the ignominious downfall of the principal section of
reformism-the completely corroded German Social Democracy
the "left wing" of the Second International went down in ruins in
Austria and Spain. But these fearful lessons passed by without
leaving a trace: the leading cadres of reformism within the party
and in the trade unions have degenerated to the marrow of their
bones. Their personal interests and their patriotic views bind
them to the bourgeoisie and they are utterly incapable of
taking the road of the class struggle.
The parties of the Second International calmly reconcile
themselves to the fact that their Belgian president,6 at the very
first beck and call of finance capital, joined hands with the
Catholic and liberal middlemen to salvage the banks at the
expense of the toiling masses. In the wake of Vandervelde there
followed de Man, the vainglorious critic of Karl Marx, the
originator of a "Plan";7 nor did the "left" centrist Spaak fail to
betray the socialist opposition in return for the livery of a
minister.8
Mindful neither of lessons nor warnings, the French Socialist
Party continues vainly to clutch at the tailcoats of the "Republi
can" bourgeoisie, and it pins greater hopes upon the friendship of
the Radicals than upon the revolutionary might of the proletar
iat.9 In all other countries in every part of the world, in Holland,
Scandinavia, Switzerland, the Social Democracy, despite the
decay of capitalism, remains the agency of the bourgeoisie within
the working class and reveals its utter inability to mobilize the
masses in its own defense against fascism.
Should the electoral successes of the Labour Party raise it once
again to power,IO the consequence would be not a peaceful
socialist transformation of Great Britain, but the consolidation of
imperialist reaction, that is to say, an epoch of civil war, in the
face of which the leadership of the Labour Party will inevitably
reveal its complete bankruptcy. The parliamentary and trade
union cretins have yet to be convinced that the threat of fascism
in England is no less real than on the continent.
The turbulent development of the crisis in the United States,
the unending chain of strike struggles, and the growth of working
class organizations, against the background of the possibilities
provided by the demagogy of the Roosevelt "plan,"ll run up
against profoundly conservative and bourgeois forces within the
working class movement. As for the Stalinist party, it is hogtied
Open Letter for the Fourth International 21
by the solemn declarations of Litvinov, who in return for the

recognition of the USSR by Yankee imperialism publicly
renounced the American Communists.12 This party, corrupted by
a decade of unprincipled maneuvers and liquidationist experi
ments with parties (Farmer-Labor Party)13 that have nothing in
common with proletarian parties either in their composition or
program-this Stalinist party, upon orders from Moscow,
confines itself to the role of a movement of radical intellectuals,
functioning in the United States as the servant of Stalinist
diplomacy. But the deep-going crisis of American capitalism is
awakening wide layers of workers from their semiprovincial
slumbers, gradually dispelling bourgeois and petty-bourgeois
illusions, impelling the proletariat toward large-scale class
actions (Toledo, Minneapolis, San Francisco),14 and creating for
the revolutionary Marxist party an opportunity to gain a
widespread and profound influence upon the development and
organization of the American working class. The historic role
that accrues to the Fourth International and its American
section-not only within the confines of the Western hemisphere
but on the world arena as well-is of exceptional importance,
since the smashing of American imperialism is of exceptional
importance for the world proletariat.
In the meantime the Third International does nothing except
squander the remaining shreds of influence and authority
acquired during the first five years of its existence. In Austria
and Spain, the Communist International, despite extremely
favorable circumstances, not only failed to create an organization
that was ih the least bit influential, but systematically compro
mised in the eyes of the workers the very idea of a revolutionary
party. The Saar plebiscite15 is evidence that the German pro
letariat lost every vestige of confidence not only in the Social
Democracy but in the Communist Party as well-the party that
so ingloriously capitulated to Hitler. In Great Britain, Belgium,
Holland, Scandinavia, on both American continents, and in the
Orient, the sections of the Communist International, burdened by
twelve years of fatal policies, are unable to emerge from their
obscurity.
True, after the German debacle, the Communist International
substituted the capitulatory policy of the united front at any price
for the adventurist policy of the "third period."16 However, the
experience in France, where this latest turn has attained its
greatest development, demonstrates that the Communist Interna
tional, with all its contradictions and zigzags, manages to retain
its function as a brake upon the proletarian revolution. Rejecting

the creation of a workers' militia in face of the immediate fascist
danger, substituting its program of immediate demands and a
policy of parliamentarism for the struggle for power, the
Communist International is the sower of the worst illusions of
reformism and pacifism, gives actual support to the right wing in
the Socialist Party against the left, demoralizes the proletarian
vanguard, and clears the road for a fascist overturn.
Finally, the founder of the Communist International, the
Communist Party of the Soviet Union, has been completely
crushed during the last few years by the uncontrolled bureau
cracy, which has turned the dictatorship of the proletariat into
the conservative absolutism of Stalin.!7 By means of persecu
tions, frame-ups, amalgams,18 and bloody repressions, the ruling
clique strives to nip in the bud every manifestation of Marxist
thought. Nowhere in the world is genuine Leninism hounded so
rabidly as in the USSR.
The most recent opportunistic somersault of the Communist
International is intimately linked with the Soviet turn in foreign
policy toward the League of Nations and the military alliance
with French imperialism.!9 The ruling bureaucracy of the USSR
has definitely arrived at the conclusion that the Communist
International is incapable of affording it any assistance what
soever against the war danger and that at the same time, it
hinders the work of Soviet diplomacy. The humiliating and truly
servile dependency of the Communist International upon the
Soviet upper crust is expressed in a particularly glaring light in
connection with the recent declaration of Stalin, appr.oving the
national defense of French imperialism.
Through the medium of an imperialist minister the leader of
the Communist International passed the order to the French
Communist Party to conclude a patriotic truce today with the
French bourgeoisie. Thus the Third International, whose con
gresses have not been convoked for almost seven years, has now
officially gone over from the internationalist position to that of
the most outright and servile social patriotism. Whether or not
the Seventh Congress, so continually postponed, convenes-the
Third International will not be resuscitated. The Stalin-Laval
communique is its death warrant.20
Meanwhile, the destructive forces of capitalism continue their

hellish work. The disintegration of the world economy, the
unemployed in the tens of millions, the ruin of the peasantry, put
the task of the socialist revolution imperiously on the agenda.

The toilers, embittered and aroused, are seeking a way out. The
prostration, collapse, and putrefaction of the Second and Third
Internationals leave the proletariat without revolutionary leader
ship and impel the petty-bourgeois masses onto the road of
despair. The bankrupt leaders seek to shift the responsibility for
the triumph of fascism onto the "passivity" of the proletariat;
thus political betrayal is supplemented with slander.
Thrashing in the grip of insolvable contradictions, capitalism
is preparing to plunge into a new slaughter of the peop les.
Ministers and diplomats openly speculate whether the outbreak
of the war will come in one or in three years from now. All the
governments, vying with one another, are preparing the most
destructive instruments, and thereby from every side they are
hastening the explosion, which may be immeasurably more
frightful than the war of 1914-18.
The leaders of the so-called working class parties and the trade
unions sing loud the praises of the beauties of peace, babble about
"disarmament," exhort their governments to make peace among
themselves, arouse the hopes of the working masses in the
League of Nations, and at the same time swear fealty to the cause
of "national defense," i.e., the defense of bourgeois rule with its
inevitable wars.
Under cover of the "united front," and even of "organic unity,"
Soviet diplomacy is preparing, behind the backs of the class
conscious workers, class peace between the sections of the two
Internationals and the bourgeoisie of those countries which are in
military alliance with the Soviet state. Thus, the outbreak of a
new war must lead to a new betrayal, which will eclipse that of
August 4, 1914.21
The betrayal of the cause of the international revolution by the

Soviet bureaucracy has thrust the world proletariat far back. The
difficulties that face the revolutionary vanguard are incredible.
Nevertheless, its position at the present time is incomparably
more favorable than on the eve of the last war. At that time,
capitalism appeared to be all-powerful, almost invincible. The
patriotic capitulation of the International came utterly as a
surprise, even to Lenin.22 Everywhere the revolutionary elements
were caught unprepared. The first international conference-very
small numerically and its majority indecisive-took place more
than a year after the outbreak of the war.23 The formation of
revolutionary cadres proceeded slowly. The possibility of proletar-
ian revolution was rejected even by the majority of the

"Zimmerwaldists." Only the October victory in Russia in the
fortieth month of the war produced a change in the situation,
providing a mighty impulse for the formation of the Third
International. 24
Today the internal weakness and corrosion of capitalism are so
evident that they serve as the main theme for fascist demagogy.
In the colossal crisis in the United States, in the no less colossal
unemployment, in the economic adventurism of Roosevelt, in the
sweep of the strike struggles, in the ferment within all working
class organizations, are being lodged for the first time the
conditions for a mighty development of the revolutionary
movement in North America. The example of the first victorious
proletarian revolution lives in the memory of the masses. The
experience of the great events of the last twenty years has been
burned into the consciousness of the best militants. Genuinely
revolutionary organizations, or at least groups, exist in all
countries. They are closely bound together ideologically, and in
part also organizationally. Even at present they represent a force
incomparably more influential, homogeneous, and steeled than
the "Zimmerwald left" which in the fall of 1915 took the initiative
in preparing for the Third International.
Within the reformist parties and trade unions, opposition
groupings are emerging and growing stronger. Some of these
assume the form of independent organizations. Within the
sections of the Communist International, as a consequence of the
prison regime, the opposition assumes a more mute and masked
character, but it is developing there as well. Even in the USSR
the need for ever new purges and repressions is proof of the fact
that the bureaucracy is unable to root out the spirit of Marxist
criticism which is so hateful to it.
The oppositionist moods and tendencies bear today a predomi
nantly centrist character, that is, intermediate between social
patriotism and revolution. Under conditions when the traditional
mass organizations are in the process of collapse and decomposi
tion, centrism represents in many cases an inevitable transitional
stage even for progressive working class groupings. Marxists
must be able to find access to all such tendencies, in order by
example and propaganda to speed their passage to the revolution
ary road. In this, the condition for success is irreconcilable
criticism of the centrist leadership, exposure of the attempts to
create a Two-and-a-Half International,25 and a ceaseless explana
tion of the fact that the revolutionary tasks of our epoch doom
beforehand to ignominious bankruptcy those unifications which

are hybrid and amorphous.
The slogan of "unity" of all working class organizations
regardless of their program and tactics is being zealously
propagated at present by the centrists, and is being ably
exploited by the reformists, who are more farsighted, and who
fear, with good cause, being thrown overboard. The centrists
often substitute the idea of merging the two old Internationals for
the idea of a new International. In reality, unity with reformists
and social patriots of the Social Democratic or Stalinist variety
signifies in the last analysis unity with the national bourgeoisie,
and consequently the inevitable split of the proletariat, interna
tionally as well as nationally, expecially in the event of war.
Genuine unity of the International and of its national sections
can be assured only upon the revolutionary Marxist foundation,
which in its turn can be created only by a break with the social
patriots. To remain silent about the principled conditions and
guarantees for proletarian unity is to join in the chorus for
broadcasting illusions, duping the workers, and preparing new
catastrophes.
The humiliating and hopeless position of the old Internationals
is adequately characterized by the fact that the president of one
became the humble minister of his king, while the real master of
the other uses the world proletarian organization as so much
small change for diplomatic deals. Regardless of what unification
maneuvers the two equally corrupted bureaucracies may under
take, it is not they who will create the unity of the proletariat, and
it is not for them to point the way out. The efforts of the centrists
to reconcile the irreconcilable and to save by means of patching
together the pieces what is fated to be destroyed, are foredoomed.
The new epoch requires a new International. The primary
condition for success on this road is the close consolidation
nationally and internationally of the genuine proletarian
revolutionists, the disciples of Marx and Lenin, on a common
program and under a common banner.
Any attempt to prescribe an identical course for all countries
would be fatal. Depending upon national conditions, upon the
degree of the decomposition of the old working class organiza
tions, and finally upon the state of their own forces at a given
moment, the Marxists (the revolutionary socialists, the interna
tionalists, the Bolshevik-Leninists) can come forward, now as an
independent organization, now as a faction in one of the old
parties or trade unions. Surely, no matter what the time or the
arena may be, this factional work serves only as a stage on the
road of creating the new parties of the Fourth International
parties which may be created either through the regroupment of
the revolutionary elements of the old organizations, or through
the agency of independent organizations. But on whatever arena,
and whatever the methods of functioning, they are bound to
speak in the name of unqualified principles and clear revolution
ary slogans. They do not play hide-and-seek with the working
class; they do not conceal their aims; they do not substitute
diplomacy and combinations for a principled struggle. Marxists
at all times and under all conditions openly say what is.
The war danger, which is a life and death question for the
people, is the supreme test for all the groupings and tendencies
within the working class. "The struggle for peace," "the struggle
against war," "war on war," and similar slogans are hollow and
fraudulent phrases if unaccompanied by the propaganda and the
application of revolutionary methods of struggle. The only way to
put an end to war is to overthrow the bourgeoisie. The only way
to overthrow the bourgeoisie is by a revolutionary assault.
As against the reactionary lie of "national defense" it is
necessary to advance the slogan of the revolutionary destruction
of the national state. To the madhouse of capitalist Europe it is
necessary to counterpose the program of the Socialist United
States of Europe, as a step toward the United States of the World.
Marxists irreconcilably reject the pacifist slogans of "disarma
ment," "arbitration," and "amity between peoples" (i.e., between
capitalist governments), etc., as opium for the popular masses.
The combinations between working class organizations and
petty-bourgeois pacifists (the Amsterdam-Pleyel Committee and
similar undertakings)2 6 render the best service to imperialism by
distracting the attention of the working class from reality with its
grave struggles and beguiling them instead with impotent
parades.
The struggle against war and imperialism cannot be the task of
any sort of special "committees." The struggle against war is the
preparation for revolution, that is to say, the task of working
class parties and of the International. Marxists pose this great
task before the proletarian vanguard, without any frills. To the
enervating slogan of "disarmament" they counterpose the slogan
of winning the army and arming the workers. Precisely in this is
one of the most important dividing lines between Marxism and
centrism drawn. Whoever dares not utter aloud the revolutionary

tasks will never find the courage to solve them.
During the year and a half that has elapsed since the
publication of the first program of the Fourth International, the
struggle for its principles and ideas has not abated for a single
day. The revolutionary national sections and groups have grown
in number: some of them extended their ranks and influence,
others attained a greater homogeneity and cohesion. Organiza
tions within the same country have united (Holland, USA); a
number of programmatic and tactical documents have been
elaborated. All this labor will indubitably proceed much better if
correlated and unified on a world scale under the banner of the
Fourth International. The impending war danger does not brook
a delay in this task for even a single day.
The new parties and the new International must be built upon
a new foundation: that is the key with which to solve all other
tasks. The tempo and the time of the new revolutionary
construction and its consummation depend, obviously, upon the
general course of the class struggle, the future victories and
defeats of the proletariat. Marxists, however, are not fatalists.
They do not unload upon the "historical process" those very tasks
which the historical process has posed before them. The initiative
of a conscious minority, a scientific program, bold and ceaseless
agitation in the name of clearly formulated aims, merciless
criticism of all ambiguity-those are some of the most important
factors for the victory of the proletariat. Without a fused and
steeled revolutionary party a socialist revolution is inconceivable.
The conditions are difficult; the obstacles are great; the tasks
are colossal; but there is no reason whatever to become
pessimistic or to lose courage. Despite all the defeats of the
proletariat, the position of the class enemy remains a hopeless
one. Capitalism is doomed. Only in the socialist revolution is
there salvation for mankind.
The very sequence of the Internationals has its own internal
logic, which coincides with the historic rise of the proletariat. The
First International advanced the scientific program of the
proletarian revolution, but it fell because it lacked a mass base.
The Second International dragged from the darkness, educated,
and mobilized millions of workers, but in the decisive hour it
found itself betrayed by the parliamentary and the trade union
bureaucracy corrupted by rising capitalism. The Third Interna
tional set for the first time the example of the victorious
proletarian revolution, but it found itself ground between the

millstones of the bureaucracy in the isolated Soviet state and the
reformist bureaucracy of the West. Today, under the conditions of
decisive capitalist collapse, the Fourth International, standing
upon the shoulders of its predecessors, enriched by the experience
of their victories and defeats, will mobilize the toilers of the
Occident and the Orient for the victorious assault upon the
strongholds of world capital.
Workers of the World, Unite!
We herewith append the "Declaration of Four" on the Fourth

International [see Writings 33-34]. Not a single line of this
manifesto has become antiquated. The present letter is only a
restatement of the "Declaration of Four" in the light of the
experience of the last year and a half.
We call upon all parties, organizations, factions, both within
the old parties and within the trade unions, all revolutionary
working class associations and groupings who are in agreement
with us upon the fundamental principles and upon the great task
we have posed-the preparation for and building of the Fourth
International-to send us their signatures to the present Open
Letter, together with any proposal or criticisms they may have.27
Individual comrades who have not been connected with our work
up to now, if they seriously intend to henceforth join the common
ranks, should get in touch with us.
The initiating organizations who are signatories to the Open
Letter have resolved to create a Provisional Contact Committee
between those parties and groups which stand upon the position
of the Fourth International. The Provisional Committee is to be
entrusted with the issuance of an information bulletin.
In the immediate future the committee is to assure the regular
and collective working out of the fundamental programmatic and
tactical documents of the Fourth International.
The question of preparing an international conference will be
decided on the basis of replies received and the general course of
the preparatory work.28
LUXEMBURG AND
THE FO URTH INTERNATIO NAL29
Cursory Remarks
on an Important Subj ect
June 24, 1935
Efforts are now being made in France and elsewhere to

construct a so-called Luxemburgism as an entrenchment for the
left centrists against the Bolshevik-Leninists. This question may
acquire considerable significance. It may perhaps be necessary to
devote a more extensive article in the near future to real and
alleged Luxemburgism. I wish to touch here only upon the
essential features of the question.
We have more than once taken up the cudgels for Rosa
Luxemburg against the impudent and stupid misrepresentations
of Stalin and his bureaucracy. And we shall continue to do so. In
doing so we are prompted not by any sentimental considerations,
but by the demands of historical-materialist criticism. Our
defense of Rosa Luxemburg is not, however, unconditional. The
weak sides of Rosa Luxemburg' s teachings have been laid bare
both theoretically and practically. The SAP people and kindred
elements (see, for example, the dilettante intellectual "proletarian
cultural" French Spartacus, the periodical of the Socialist
students appearing in Belgium, and often also the Belgian Action
socialiste, etc. )30 make use only of the weak sides and the
inadequacies which were by no means decisive in Rosa; they
generalize and exaggerate these weaknesses to the utmost and
build up a thoroughly absurd system on that basis. The paradox
consists in this, that in their latest turn the Stalinists, too
without acknowledging or even understanding it-come close in
theory to the caricatured negative sides of Luxemburgism, to say
nothing of the traditional centrists and left centrists in the Social
Democratic camp .
29
There is no gainsaying that Rosa Luxemburg passionately

counterposed the spontaneity of mass actions to the "victory
crowned" conservative p olicy of the German Social Democracy,
especially after the revolution of 1905.:1 1 This counterposition had
a thoroughly revolutionary and progressive character. At a much
earlier date than Lenin, Rosa Luxemburg grasped the retarding
character of the ossified p arty and trade union apparatus and
began a struggle against it. Inasmuch as she counted upon the
inevitable sharpening of class conflicts, she always predicted the
certainty of the independent elemental appearance of the masses
against the will and against the line of m arch of the officialdom.
In these broad historical outlines, Ros a was proven right. For the
revolution of 1 9 18 was "spontaneous , " that is, it was accom
plished by the masses against all the provisions and all the
precautions of the p arty officialdom . 3 2 On the other h and, the
whole of Germany's subsequent history amply showed that
spontaneity alone is far from enough for success; Hitler's regime
is a weighty argument against the panacea of spontaneity.
Rosa herself never confined herself to the mere theory of
spontaneity, like Parvus, for example, who later bartered his
fatalism about the s o cial revolution for the most revolting
opportunism.33 In contrast to Parvus, Rosa Luxemburg exerted
herself to educate the revolutionary wing of the proletariat in
advance and to bring it together organizationally as far as
possible. In Poland, she built up a very rigid independent
organization. The most that can be said is that in her historical
philosophical evaluation of the l abor m ovement, the prepar atory
selection of the vanguard, in comparison with the mass actions
that were to be expected, fell too short with Rosa; whereas
Lenin-without consoling himself with the miracles of future
actions-took the advanced workers and constantly and tirelessly
welded them together into firm nuclei, illegally or legally, in the
mass organizations or underground, by means of a sharply
defined program .
Rosa's theory of spontan eity w a s a wholesome weapon against
the ossified apparatus of reformism. By the fact that it was often
directed against Lenin's w ork of building up a revolutionary
apparatus , it revealed-to b e sure, only in embryo-its reaction
ary features . With Ros a herself this occurred only episodically.
She was much too realistic in the revolutionary sense to devel op
the elements of the theory of spontaneity into a consummate
metaphysics. In practice , she herself, as has already been said,
undermined this theory at every step. After the revolution of
Luxemburg and the Fourth International 31
November 1918 , she began the arduous l abor of assembling the

proletarian vanguard. Despite her theoretically very weak
manuscript on the Soviet revolution,:J4 written in prison but never
published by her, Rosa's subsequent work allows the sure
conclusion that, day by day, she was moving closer to Lenin's
theoretically clearly delineated conception concerning conscious
leadership and spontaneity . (It must surely have been this
circumstance that prevented her from making public her
manuscript against Bolshevik policy, which was later so
shamefully abused. )
Let us again attempt t o apply the conflict between spontaneous
mass actions and purposeful organiz ational work to the present
epoch. What a mighty expenditure of strength and selflessness
the toiling masses of all the civilized and half-civilized countries
have exerted since the World War! Nothing in the previous
history of mankind could comp are with it. To this extent Rosa
Luxemburg was entirely right as against the philistines, the
corporals, and the blockheads of straight-marching "victory
crowned" bureaucratic conservatism. B ut it is just the s quander
ing of these immeasurable energies that forms the basis of the
great setback of the proletariat and the successful fascist
advance. Without the slightest exaggeration it may be s aid: the
whole world situation is determined by the crisis of proletarian
leadership. The labor movement is today still encumbered with
huge remnants of the old bankrupt organizations. After the
countless sacrifices and disappointments, the bulk of the
European proletariat, at least, has withdrawn into its shell. The
decisive lesson which it has drawn, consciously or half
consciously, from bitter experiences, reads: great actions require a
great leadership. For current affairs , the workers still give their
votes to the old organizations . Their votes-but by no means their
boundless confidence . On the other h and, after the miserable
collapse of the Third International, it is much har der to move
them to bestow their confidence upon a new revolutionary
organization. That's j ust where the crisis of the proletarian
leadership lies. To sing a monotonous song about indefinite
future mass actions in this situation, in contrast to the purposeful
selection of the cadres of a new International, means to carry on
a thoroughly reactionary work. That's j ust where the role of the
SAP lies in the "historical process . "
This fine fellow P aul Froelich can, o f course, summon u p his
Marxian recollections in order to stem the tide of theoretical
spontaneity-barbarism . These purely literary protective measures
hardly prevent the pupils of a Miles (the precious author of the

peace resolution and the no less precious author of the article in
the French edition of the Youth Bulletin), the Oscar Wasser
manns and the Boris Goldenbergs, from carrying on the most
disgraceful spontaneity nonsense in the ranks of the SAP itself.35
The practical politics of Schwab3 6 (the artful "not saying what is"
and the eternal consolation of future mass actions and the
spontaneous "historical process") also signifies nothing but a
tactical exploitation of a thoroughly distorted and bowdlerized
Luxemburgism. And to the extent that the Paul Froelichs fail to
make an open attack upon this theory and practice in their own
party, their anti-Miles articles acquire the character of a search
for a theoretical alibi. Such an alibi really becomes necessary
only when one takes part in a deliberate crime.
The crisis of proletarian leadership cannot, of course, be
overcome by means of an abstract formula. It is a question of an
extremely prolonged process. Not of a purely "historical" process,
that is, of the objective premises of conscious activity, but of an
uninterrupted chain of ideological, political, and organizational
measures for the purpose of fusing together the best, most
conscious elements of the world proletariat beneath a spotless
banner, elements whose number and self-confidence must be
constantly strengthened, whose connections with wider sections
of the proletariat must be developed and deepened-in a word, of
restoring to the proletariat, under new and highly difficult and
onerous conditions, its historical leadershIp. The latest sponta
neity confusionists have just as little right to refer to Rosa as the
miserable Comintern bureaucrats have to refer to Lenin. Put
aside the incidentals which developments have overcome, and we
can, with full justification, place our work for the Fourth
International under the sign of the "three" L's," that is, under the
sign not only of Lenin, but also of Luxemburg and Liebknecht.37
THE SAP AND THE OPEN LETTER38
July 2, 1 9 3 5
To the International Secretariat
Dear Friends :
I must admit that the business concerning the manifesto for the
Fourth International is beginning to worry me very much. At
first I quietly accepted approaching the SAP as part of the
venture. Now I realize that this was a mistake.
The manifesto is issued by organizations that really, i.e.,
actively, endorse the Fourth International. The SAP does not
belong in this category. Like every other organization it will have
the opportunity to express its opinion after the publication of our
appeal. But we had absolutely no reason or inducement to show
special consideration to this group in particular. It would be a
crime to forget that after the publication of the August 1933
Declaration of Four, the SAP sabotaged the fight for the Fourth
International in every way possible. The fact that the agreement
of the four went to pieces right after it was formed naturally
caused great damage to the struggle for the Fourth International.
The only reason for this long interruption in the organizational
struggle lies in the opportunistic ill-will of the SAP leadership
together with the criminal de Kadt clique.39
Two irretrievable years have elapsed. The war is knocking at
the door. The Third International is forming an alliance with the
Second International in an act of vile p olitical treachery. Now we
wish to unfurl the banner of the Fourth International again, and
at this very moment we politely turn to that group that betrayed
us once and is now carrying out an unprincipled and (in the last
analysis) treacherous political course in France, the political
focus of Europe today.
Of course, if one looks at approaching the SAP under the above
characterized circumstances from a p urely organizational point
of view-as I tried to do some weeks ago-it can be regarded as a
33
34 Writings of Leon Trotsky (1935-36j
totally harmless organizational step. Fundamentally this is not

so. The very need to bow once more before our treacherous former
ally signifies-if one thinks it through-a lack of inner confi
dence and revolutionary self-assurance in our own ranks or in
those of our closest allies.
If one has carefully thought through the historical situation,
including the chicanery of the Comintern, if one is clear about the
magnitude of our revolutionary mission, then there should not be
a single day's further hesitation in carrying out the most
fundamental and imperative task: to speak out before the world
proletariat, to say what is, and to call upon the best elements to
build a new International! Making the fulfillment of this task
dependent upon the already proven opportunistic ill-will of the
SAP is a sad state of affairs that will cause some more
unpleasant surprises.
Only helpless opportunists can say: the question is not so vital;
the "masses" are not interested enough in the Fourth Internation
al as yet; we still have enough time for small-scale diplomatic
maneuvers, etc. It is true that the masses know far too little
(partly because of our own negligence) about the banner of the
Fourth International; but what the masses need and what more
and more elements understand-or at least feel-the need for is a
correctly oriented, determined, courageous revolutionary leader
ship. And those who waver and hesitate on the question of the
Fourth International are inevitably not up tQ the historical task
on all other questions. When they write, their pens fumble; when
they speak, their voices fumble; they have not cut their ties to the
past. And the masses have an unmistakable instinct for the inner
confidence of the spoken and written word. Various parts of the
class can follow the wrong slogans, but they will never have
confidence in uncertain, wavering leaders, who are constantly
shifting their weight from one foot to the other. Of course, self
assurance alone is not enough: the political course must be
correct. But politics in this new period of storm and stress must
be guided by great political and social factors, and not by
unimportant, petty considerations. In any case, in this period
every vacillation, every instance of indecision, is a guarantee of
certain ruin.
What has been said does not in any way exclude adaptation to
existing reality. Quite the contrary: our most recent experiences
in France prove that we should not shrink from the boldest
measures in order to find our road to the masses.
I
It is one thing to keep in mind the real masses and their turns
The SAP and the Open Letter 35
when considering a turn of our own, and something quite the

contrary to c ourt the gracious approval of experienced opportun
ists and professional dissemblers when taking an important step
forward. Carrying out cautious work inside a mass organization,
hiding, if necessary, disguising oneself from the parliamentary
and trade union police of capitalism-all this not only is allowed,
but is our duty. But only under one condition : that it is a real
fight for the real revolutionary banner which is involved. And
this banner must now be hoisted before the international
proletariat by the most advanced elements, i . e . , the vanguard of
the vanguard. This banner is that of the Fourth International.
Not the number alone, of course , but a program, a strategy, and a
center for planning and leadership.
It seems that the proposal is to wait for the answer of the SAP
until July 10. And then? The centrist fakers, who are only
concerned now about delaying final bankruptcy as long as
possible, will propose a different text or a whole number of
amendments to us. What then? Should we have a new interna
tional discussion then about things that are clear to all of us-or
at least should be clear? The SAP leaders, having sabotaged our
fight for the Fourth International for two years, and with
undeniable success, are now being given a chance to continue
exercising their political function in a new form as best they can.
We have all (and I do not by any means exclude myself) made a
serious mistake, which we will regret. In order not to allow the
disastrous consequences of this mistake to b e compounded, we
have to put a stop to it at once. I make the following proposal:
a. If the SAP sends its signature by July 10, without any
reservations (which is as good as excluded) , we will publish the
manifesto with the SAP' s signature at once.
b. If the SAP counterposes a different text to ours, we will
publish our text at once without engaging in any further
negotiations about the SAP text.
c. If the SAP proposes amendments to our text, we will give
them the right to publish their reservations under their own
name, but we will publish our text with our signatures without
delay.
In other words : we will not allow any more delays , even for
twenty-four h o urs.
If we had already published our document some weeks ago, it
would have made a strong impression on the ranks of the SAP,
would have accelerated the internal struggle, and would p erhaps
have attracted revolutionary elements of the SAP-if there are
any-to us. Through waiting and endless negotiations we only

cover the wavering of the SAP, assist the right wing against the
left, and worst of all, we ourselves begin to waver. And any
group, I repeat, which wavers or even seems to waver in this
period is bound for destruction.
L. Trotsky
P.S.-The latest slogan of the SAP "for a new Zimmerwald"

only shows the desire of these gentlemen to extricate themselves
unnoticed from the bankruptcy of the IAG.40 We have not the
slightest interest in supporting the new confusion directly or
indirectly. That does not mean, of course, that we reject in
advance taking part in possible meetings of different internation
alist, left centrist, etc., groups, on an individual basis. Everything
depends on the concrete circumstances. Thus, for example, our
French section was quite right in taking part in the attempt of
different groupings to offer resistance to the new chauvinistic
wave. But we can only participate in such ventures in closed
ranks and as pioneers of the Fourth International, with strong
internal homogeneity. Otherwise we ours elves will fall victim to
the confusion of the SAP and go from disaster to disaster.
L.T.
FOR A SPECIAL INFORMATION
S ERVICE4 1
July 2 , 1935
Dear Comrades:
I am sending you a letter dealing with the publication of the
manifesto of the Fourth International. I implore you not to wait
on this question any longer. If you have the Americans'
signature, this will be sufficient to exert the appropriate pressure
on the Dutch organization, if necessary. I hope that the Dutch
will not withhold their signature . . . even without organization
al pressure. No matter what, the manifesto has to be published by
the eleventh.
Some remarks about other questions:
1. The internal life of the Second and especially the Third
International remains a book sealed with seven seals. Here too,
saying what is, is an important political task. In order to fulfill
this task, we have to know what is, i.e. , what is going on in the
parties. A special information service should be organized to
carefully collect and classify all the news, even the small and
personal items, in somewhat the way military staffs do with news
from the country of the presumed enemy. Everything of
importance or organizational value should be published in our
press immediately.
In fact, nothing like this happens. Rather, one gets the
impression that our editors are embarrassed to deal with the
internal and especially the personal matters of the parties in their
papers and also that they consider these matters "gossip." This is
completely wrong. Sometimes the best way to make general ideas
clear to the reader is to use concrete, vivid examples, even if they
are of the second order.
A short time ago, for example, I received a copy of a letter from
Woo to Comrade Erde, containing highly interesting and
37
38 Writings of Leon Tro tsky (1935-36)
informative descriptions of the internal processes in the Comin

tern and its German section. 4 2 All this should be known by the
broad public. The comrades mentioned above and many more
could certainly give our press regular articles and notes of this
kind.
There is, for example, a great deal of talk about the conflict
between Wels and Aufhaeuser and about the events in the .
Austrian Social Democratic Party, etc. Our press does not cover
this. This abstention is characteristic of a spirit of isolation and a
lack of interest in the internal processes of other organization s ,
i . e . , also a lack of will t o intervene into these processes.
The International Secretariat could perhaps give advice and s et
an example in this area.
2. It seems that the Stalinists in France for the time being have
abandoned Stalin's position in favor of the position of the SFI O . 4 3
Blum probably argued successfully a s follows: If w e come out
openly for militarism now, we will be liquidated even before the
outbreak of the war. We have to maintain an ambiguous policy
now, so that we can complete the turn at the moment the war
starts and carry the workers with us on a wave of patriotism.
'WORLD PARTY OF SOCIAL
REVOLUTI O N ' 4 4
July 1 4 , 1 9 3 5
T o the International Secretariat
Dear Comrades:
1 . Our International must have a name. The "Fourth" is only a
number, not a name. We can call it neither S ocialist nor
Communist, because these two names are already taken, and in a
very compromising way. In the future we will certainly make the
word "communism , " i . e . , the banner of Marx and Lenin, an
honorable one once again. For the moment, we cannot use it.
"Revolutionary socialist" does not mean very much either,
because the centrists tend to hide behind this name. It seems to
me that the only appropriate name for our International is: World
Party of Social Revolution. This name has the great advantage of
clearly and unambiguously characterizing the historical task of
our epoch, thereby j ustifying the existence of the new Interna
tional . The Second International laments over the ruins of
capitalism. The Third is a tool for maintaining the rule of the
Soviet bureaucracy. The Fourth is the World Party of Socialist
Revolution.
In the course of time , our sections will be able to adopt this
name-at least as a byname. For example: "Workers Party of the
USA (American section of the World Party of Social Revolution)."
It would be completely wrong to object that the social
revolution is not the only and exclusive task of the workers'
movement, since all struggles in this p eriod must be adapted to
the needs of the social revolution and the name of the party has
to indicate its principal task. It would be even more false to say
that the name could frighten away the "masses . " That would be a
classical centrist argument. The revolution is not a historical
perspective but the task of the day. Our approach is precisely to
39
40 Writings of Leon Tro tsky (1935-36)
call this historical task by its name_ The name has to correspond
to the thinking and the imagination of the masses and at the
same time clearly distinguish us from the other organizations.
The question of the name is highly important. Therefore it has
to be selected carefully and with the greatest possible unanimity.
It is absolutely necess ary for all sections to place this question on
the agenda and have a discussion about it. At the same time, the
sections should be informed about all other proposals, so that we
can set the name of the new International by a referendum-let
us say by mid-September. I believe that public meetings could
successfully be devoted to this theme. Our propagandists could
seriously motivate the name and then have the meeting itself
take a vote on it. That way, broader layers will consider
themselves to be cofounders of the new International.
2 . It can be presumed that a new amalgam is being prepared in
Moscow to strengthen the last one and claim new victims. It is
abs o l u tely necessary for our press to deal with this . It would also
be good to write an explanatory memorandum for the entire
workers ' press all over the world. The new Rundschau gives
enough information about it. Comrade Para bellum could also use
the Russian press for such a memorandum, which could then be
published in the name of the IS.45
3 . On the questi on of the General Council: The members of the
council in every ci ty form an action committee, which naturally
has no right to make decisions, but could be of great service in
this matter. The central focus would be the Paris membership of
the council, which could play an important role through regular
collaboration with the Amsterdam secretariat.46
THE ITALO- ETHIOPIAN C O N FLICT47
Published July 17, 1 9 3 5
T o the International Secretariat
Far too little attention is paid to the Italo-Ethiopian conflict by

our sections, especially by the French section. This question is
highly important, first for its own sake, and second from the
standpoint of the turn by the C omintern. Of course, we are for the
defeat of Italy and the victory of Ethiopia, and therefore we must
do everything possible to hinder by all available means support
to Italian imperialism by the other imperialist powers , and at the
same time facilitate the delivery of armaments , etc., to Ethiopia
as best we can.
However, w e want to stress the point that this fight is directed
not against fascism, but against imperialism. When war is
involved, for us it is not a question of who is "better," the Negus
or Mussolini ; 4 8 rather, it is a question of the relationship of
classes and the fight of an underdeveloped n ation for indepen
dence against imperialism. The Italian comrades might give us a
short historical summary indicating how Crispi's defeat had a
positive effect on the further development of Italy. 4 9
41
FOR DEFE N S E OF SOVIET
REVOLUTIONARIES50
July 1 7 , 1935
Dear Comrades:
1. It is very important that Action socialiste has adopted the
proposal for an international commission on acts of terror
against revolutionary elements in the Soviet Union. I think we
have to build a big international action around it. The IS could
publish an appeal on this question. Perhaps the secretariat could
do so for the Fourth International. In any case the matter should
not be dragged out. In my opinion the appeal should be short and
it should have an unemotional, totally "objective" character:
The terrorist measures against Communist elements and
against Lenin's old co-workers are increasing (the Zinoviev
affair, the Yenukidze case).51 The charges against old and young
revolutionaries in the official and officious Comintern press
(Deutsche Rundschau) are becoming increasingly monstrous and
difficult to believe. (Perhaps some quotations from the Rund
schau.) Even the big Comintern newspapers do not dare to
reprint these charges from the Rundschau. Nevertheless, individ
uals are being sentenced and executed on the basis of these
charges. The disquiet and concern, and often the indignation,
within the ranks of the entire world proletariat are very great. In
order to dispel the growing mistrust, the Soviet government has
to prove with facts and documents that it is really a question of
combating the enemies of the workers' state and not one of a war
of extermination by a bureaucratic grouping carried out against
its opponents and critics. This it can only achieve through an
international commission whose composition could guarantee
complete objectivity as well as loyalty to the workers' state and
the world proletariat.
42
For Defense of Soviet Revolutionaries 43
This is only an approximate indication of the contents. The

task would be to win the support of different groups, organiza
tions, and individuals. In this matter collaboration with respect
able centrist organizations is completely in order. If the proj ect is
undertaken energetically, perhaps the creation of an internation
al relief organization could be achieved.
2. We have not received the manifesto yet. The supplement on
America could create the suspicion that the intention was to
commit oneself and others through general phrases to a position
on the struggle of the different tendencies in the WPUS. 52 If that
was not the obj ective of the authors of the supplement, so much
the better.
3. On the composition of the General Council: of course every
section must be represented in it, even those that are not
represented in the International Secretariat. In my last letter I
did not mention some sections only because the question of
personnel did not seem clear to me.
In the German section, for example, Bur, Johre, Fischer, or
Nicolle as members of the IS?53 It should be decided in
consultation with the section itself which two comrades should be
incorporated. I am not clear on how matters stand in Spain,
Greece, and Latin America. In any case, all important groups, or
those that have qualified comrades (our Polish friends, too), must
be in the General Council. During the period of illegality, when
thoroughly organized congresses will be impossible, the General
Council would remain the decision-making body.
4. We must now give the Bel gian experience the closest
attention. It is already clear: essentially our Belgian friends are
right. Sharp conflict with Marteau is the best protection against a
Stalinist degeneration of the left wing of the SP.54 In the course of
time the SP wing will acquire a totally different significance in
Belgium than in France. By the way, the Belgian example proves
that in entering into reformist or centrist parties it is not so much
a question of legal rights, but rather one of the political situation
inside and outside the p arty. Details in the letter to the Polish
comrades.
PERSPE CTIVES IN POLAND55
July 1 8 , 1 9 3 5
T o the Polish Bolshevik-Leninists
Dear Comrades :
I have received from the IS the material dealing with Poland
and also a letter addressed to me, containing a list of precisely
formulated question s . The discussions among the Polish com
rades are going on in two areas, connected but distinct: on the
one hand, the general principles and criteria of the workers'
movement and its tendencies; and on the other, an assessment of
the opportunities for work for our Polish comrades.
As to the general question, I think the answer has been given to
a very large extent by the events of the recent period. Have we
abandoned the Leninist assessment of reformism and centrism?
Or should we revise it? S hould we abandon the idea of the Fourth
International?
Whoever holds this o pinion is absolutely not one of us. Our
policy is sufficiently characterized by the following facts: (a) the
fusions in America and H olland;56 (b) the entry of our section into
the French and Belgian Social Democratic parties; (c) a hard
campaign against the SAP and its like; (d) the publication of the
manifesto on the Fourth International. It is only when one has
all these facts before one's eyes that one can understand their
mutual interdependence and have an exact picture of the
strategic line of the Bolshevik-Leninists . We can permit ourselves
to enter the opportunist p arties because we have educated cadres;
because we are implacable toward professional confusionists of
the SAP kind; because we are doing all our work either as an
independent organiz atio n or, temporarily, as a faction inside the
opportunist parties , under the banner of the Fourth International,
that is to say, witho ut any conciliation with the ideas and
methods of the Second and Third International s . Whoever
destroys this form of organization, which we did not invent but
44
Perspectives in Poland 45
which was imposed on u s by the total situation; whoever isolates

tactics from strategy and makes a universal formula out of an
episodic rule-that person courts the danger of perishing in the
swamp of opportunism or in the desert of sectarianism.
It is wrong to claim that we should not enter a Social

Democratic party unless we are accepted as a statutory faction
and allowed our own press, etc. No doubt it would be excellent if
we had all that. But o utside of France, where the SP has a quite
particular structure and tradition, we never find such conditions.
Nor are they decisive. As the Belgian example shows, entry is
conditioned by political, not constitutional motives. It is not a
matter of entering a given party with fanfare, but of having real
opportunities to develop revolutionary work inside the party.
Inside the Stalinist p arties our friends must work in a completely
illegal way. The same is admissible equally for reformist parties.
For us it is a question not of decorou s politics but of revolutionary
politics .
In B elgium we all had some fears in view of the fact that our
section was obliged to give up its press and, without rights
"guaranteed" in the slightest, enter the SP, a p arty, moreover,
which was sharing governmental power. But facts proved . our
Belgian comrades right. They now play a very important role in
the left wing of the p arty, which is sharply expressed by the fact
that they have ousted Dr. Marteau, a Stalinist agent, from the
leadership of the oppositionist newspaper, L 'Action socialiste.
This fact cannot be overestimated. A revolutionary leadership,
therefore , can develop only inside this party and the unions
connected with it. The question was whether this would take
place in a Stalinist or in a Leninist direction. We can now say
with complete certainty that the Stalinist perspectives have
diminished considerably while ours h ave increased by as much.
It is very important to notice that the Stalinist Marteau has
support only in Brussels, where he is faced by Vereecken and his
group. By that it i s incontestably proved that the Vereecken
group has not the slightest influence on the left wing of the
POB.57
Many counterblows may yet b e produced, in France as in
Belgium. But an important step forward has b een made.
Discussion on the correctness of the organizational turn, in the
last instance, has been cut short by the verdict of practice.
Some comrades appear dismayed, even discouraged , by the fact

that the recently fused parties in America and Holland have not
achieved greater success, the Dutch p arty even having suffered

losses in the last elections. Marxist analysis in this case too is the
only guarantee against exaggerated hopes and against unjustifi
able disappointments . The two p arties are not new formations
but have their origin in old organizations. They are barely known
to the working class as autonomous p arties. After great historic
disillusionments, the proletarian vanguard does not readily place
its confidence in unknown formations. Only an extremely clear
program of action, only concentrated agitation, only active
particip ation in the fights and inner life of the mass organiza
tions can anchor n ew parties in the consciousness of the
proletarian vanguard. That has not yet been achieved in Holland
and America. It can be said with certainty that our progress in
France and Belgium is relatively m ore important than in Holland
and America. To draw some general conclusions from that would
be wrong, or at least premature. Every undertaking needs time to
ripen. We should examine very closely the developments in the
various countries , e stablish their similarities , examine the
conditions for them, and only then draw the necessary conclu
sions . In any case, we should not lose too much time getting on
with it.
As for the concrete Polish question s , it is extremely difficult for

me-despite the important documents our Polish friends sent us
to make up my mind. The dominant tone of these documents
could be called pessimistic: the working class is said to be in no
state to fight; fascism supposedly could develop without resis
tance, etc. Is that really the case? The grossest mistake one can
make in such cases is to underestimate the possibilities for
fighting.
What does the PPS [Polish Socialist Party] represent?"R How
many workers does it count in its ranks? What is its political
influence in general, and inside the unions in particular? How is
the inner life of the p arty developing ? What the documents and
letters have to say about this is too general. It can be supposed
that our group-and this is explained by its whole past-keeps
itself rather much apart from the PPS, has only superficial and
casual relations with it, and consequently does not keep an eye on
its inner life. Under these conditions the matter is revealed as an
equation with too many unknowns.
From a hypothetical p oint of view, it can be supposed that even
in the case where the triumph of the present regime is total and
meets no resistance, and where the PPS similarly disappears
without resistance, a revolutionary faction of the PPS must split
Perspectives in Poland 47
off under the pressure of events ; in other words, the revolutionary

elements of the old party will survive only in illegality. It would
be very important, in this case too, to draw close to the
proletarian wing of the p arty in good time .
If the regime is going t o become totalitarian, attempts a t a
united front will be more energetic, and it is altogether possible
that they might lead to practical results through an eventual split
in the PPS. S o the left wing of this party can thus also open the
way for our comrades to those Stalinists capable of developing.
Moreover, it seems altogether clear that, under these conditions,
taking refuge in the Bund would mean turning one's back on all
opportunities for further development. 5 9 On the other hand, one
cannot help the Jewish workers to get out of the dead end of the
Bund toward a larger arena except by revolutionary work
crowned with s uccess among the Polish proletariat. *
It seems, then , that our friends should, for a specific period,
give up general discussions among themselves and, without
expulsions and without pushing anyone aside, devote all their
energies to creating for themselves connections with the left
wing, particularly the proletarian elements in the PPS and the
unions, and to collecting all the relevant m aterial in such a way
as to make definite decisions on the basis of the facts of this large
inquiry; this , at the same time , can serve as propaganda for our
ideas.
Trotsky
July 28, 1 935

Dear Comrades :
I would like to complete my first letter with some remarks . The
more I think about it the more inaccurate it seems to me to assert
that, without great revolutionary events in other countries, the
Polish proletariat would be incapable of struggling. In Poland
there has not b een any catastrophe to paralyze the working class
for years . There is great disillusionment there, but underneath,
the still-unbroken power of the proletariat is sleeping . It is
possible that a powerful external blow is necessary; but a blow
like this could also come from purely Polish events . First: the
*This, naturally, does not exclude the possibility of the eventual entry
of one or another group of our comrades into the Bund. But the analysis is
concerned with our general orientation.
situation of the peasantry seems unbearable. The agrarian

question remains unsolved. * Second: the n ational question.
Third : the conflicts between the bourgeois p arties; boycott of the
elections, etc. Fourth: the quarrel-almost inevitable-in the
leaderless camp of Pilsudski.60 To diagnose these processes in
good time one shouldn't go to sleep from a pessimistic anticipa
tion of events. Such a state o f mind is particularly dangerous in a
revolutionary general staff.
In my first l etter I quoted the example of France and Belgium . I

must now quote a third example, that of Switzerland. There, our
group publishes an independent sheet! Trotz Alledem! [In spite of
everything!] Yet, at the same time, the maj ority of the group is
inside the SP, gathers the left opposition there, and tries
successfully to take over the leadership. You understand the
differences : i n France , entry with one's own organization and
paper; in Belgium , giving up the paper in favor of systematic,
internal, faction work; in Switzerland, internal faction work plus
an independent paper outside the party .
The PPS is a legal party . Our participation in its inner life and
its activities (in whatever form this participation takes place)
coincides to a l arge extent with a combination of legal and illegal
work. If you were to succeed in creating a faCtion inside the PPS
(and a complementary one inside the Bund) you would certainly
have to complement your work with legal and illegal publica
tions.
All this is only hypothetical. I hold firmly to my first proposal:
devote some months to research work and making approaches ,
then and finally take a firm p osition.
*The agrari an question appears , moreover , to be enormously preoccupy

ing governmental circles at present. Don't you think our organization
could distribute a manifesto on this question to put it on the agenda for
the working class?
TO YOUNG COMMUN ISTS AND
S O C IALISTS WHO WISH TO THINK61
July 2 2 , 1 9 3 5
The youth are a t present deeply preoccupied with the question

of the war danger. And ri ghtly so. Their heads are at stake first.
We revolutionary Marxists rej ect absolutely those prescriptions
against war that are issued by the leaders of the Second and
Third International s . They preach "disarmament" and "accord"
through the League of Nation s . This means that they believe in
the possibility of changing the nature of capitalism through
peaceful reforms , since the armed struggle between capitalist
states applies just as much to the nature of capitalism as the
competition between individual capitalists or their trusts. There
are people who call themselves Socialists or Communists who
characterize the capitalist state as a thoroughly imperi alist set-up
but at the same time believe in the League of Nations, that is, in
the stock exchange of the imperialist states.
For Marxists the struggle against war coincides with the
struggle against imperialism. The means for this struggle is not
"general disarmament" but the arming of the proletariat for the
revolutionary overthrow of the bourgeoisie and the establishment
of a workers' state. Our slogan is not the League of Nations, but
the Soviet United States of Europe and of the entire world!
Today we see in France how the reformists and the so-called
"Communists" (in reality only Stalinists) have allied themselves
with the Radicals, ostensibly for the purpose of struggling
against war and fascism. Who are the Radicals ? A thoroughly
imperialist party which stands for the Versailles treaty and for
the French colonial empire.62 How can one lead a struggle
against the imperialists' war together with an imperialist party?
Naturally, the Radicals readily speak for peace. Hitler also
works in the sweat of his brow for peace. They are all for peace:
priests , bankers , generals. But what does the pacifism of the
bourgeois governments and parties mean? Vile hypocrisy. Every
robber prefers, if possible, to take away his victim's purse
49
"peacefully" without taking his life. Mussolini would naturally

prefer to pocket Ethiopia "peacefully, " that is, without the
expenses and sacrifices of war. England and France would like to
enj oy their plunder "in peace." But woe to whoever hinders them!
That is the meaning of capitalist love for peace.
Petty-bourgeois p acifism is in general sincere, but so much the
more blind and h elpless, since in essence it is but the belief of
peasants and petty merchants that it is possible to make the
ruling classes better, to disarm the great capitalist robbers and
induce them to live peacefully side by side. But with all its good
intentions petty-bourgeois pacifism becomes a drug with the help
of which the imperialists overcome the masses at the proper
moment and make cannon fodder out of them. We accuse the
leaders of the Second and Third Internationals of helping
capitalism to prepare a new world slaughter through their
nonsensical twaddle. In a new war the reformists and the
Stalinists will in the m aj ority of cases stand on the side of their
governments, especially in France, Belgium , and Czechoslovakia.
Whoever really wants to fight against war must speak to the
people clearly, must gather the fighters under one revolutionary
banner, under the ban ner of the Fourth International.
Between the two old "Internationals" (which in reality are no
longer that) and us, the champions of the Fourth International,
stand many factions and intermediate groups, which we call
centrist. This name is not an insult, as many simple minds
suppose, but a thoroughly scientific term. We call those currents
centrist which vacillate between Marxism (internationalism) and
reformism (patriotism), but which tend, by their nature, to come
nearer to reformism. The French Bataille Socialiste group,
centrist in character, combines declaring itself for the defense of
the fatherland with worship of p acifism (Zyromsky), and
tolerates at its left wing a hazy internationalism (Pivert).63 Such
currents are to be found in a number of countries. In the present
period we can with j ustice point to the German Socialist Workers
Party (SAP) as an example of centrism. The SAP is by no means
a mass organization. But it has quite a number of old party and
trade union functionaries who are scattered as emigrants in
various countries. They often possess a considerable knack for
practical work and a certain theoretical schooling, but never does
their activity go beyond centrist conceptions. That is why they
are against the Fourth International. That is why they combat
parties and organizations which rally around the banner of the
Fourth International. That is why they seek friends to the right,
while they direct their enmity to the left.
To Young Communists and Socialists 51
From time to time they even declare that they are really not
against the Fourth International as such, but that they find it not
timely. This obj ection, however, is devoid of all content. What is
involved is not a mathematical but a political problem, where the
time factor is secondary. Socialism is also not "timely" as long as
we are not in a position to realize it. But we have inscribed it on
our banner and carry this b anner quite openly to the masses.
Once we become convinced that the struggle against war and for
socialism requires the revolutionary consolidation of the proletar
ian vanguard on the basis of a new program, we must
immediately set about the task.
Whoever is today, like the SAP, against the Fourth Internation
al, against its defenders and builders, shows thereby that
consciously or unconsciously he wishes to leave open the b ack
door to the reformists and patriots. This assertion may sound like
"sectarianism" or even "slander" to the naive. The most recent,
thoroughly anti-Marxist position of the SAP on the war question
has, however, irrefutably confirmed our opinion. Whoever h as not
read the famous SAP resolution on the "struggle for peace," must
by all means get it and learn certain passages by heart. 64 No
high-sounding phrases on the socialist revolution and the
dictatorship of the proletariat can wipe away the real, that is,
pacifist, character of the SAP policy which proposes to gather
"all forces" for disarmament and peace, to form for this purpose
an "all-inclusive committee. " Whoever preaches that the imperial
ists can-under the "pressure" of the masses-disarm peacefully,
denies at the same time the necessity of proletarian revolution.
For what sort of a revolution can there be against a disarmed
bourgeoisie? There is an undeniable relation between pacifism in
internal policy, and pacifism in foreign policy. A man may swear
to us solemnly that he is a m aterialist, but if he goes to church on
Easter he remains for us a miserable victim of the priesthood.
Whoever combines phrases on the social revolution with
agitation for p acifist disarmament is no proletarian revolutionist
but a pitiful victim of petty-bourgeois prejudice.
But are there not, we are often reminded, good, revolutionary
minded workers in the SAP and similar organizations who must
not be pushed away? This argument misses the mark. Very
likely, almost certainly, there are in the SAP and similar
organizations workers who are not satisfied with the vacillating,
evasive policy of the leaders. However, we can best help these
elements capable of development by exposing mercilessly the
false policy of their leaders . At first even the advanced elements
are taken unawares. Nevertheless, criticism penetrates their
minds. Then come new facts which strengthen our criticism. And
finally the honest revolutionary worker says to himself: the
Leninists are right, I must go with them. It was always so in the
development of a revolutionary party. And it will be so this time.
Young comrades and friends! We combat everything that is
ambiguous and confused not out of "fanatical" hatred, and
certainly not out of personal animosity. Our stern epoch has little
respect for sentimentality, personal consideration, and similar
lovely things. It demands a correct program and an iron will to
victory. To the masses that are seeking a revolutionary leader
ship we must display the greatest patience and attentiveness.
Hundreds and thousands of times we must show them revolution
ary principles through their daily experiences. But on those who
appear before the masses as leaders, who unfurl their own
banner, we must place the strictest demands. The first is clarity.
The shilly-shalliers, the confused, the centrists, the pacifists,
can vegetate years on end, issue papers, hold conferences, yes,
even register temporary organizational successes. Great historic
turns, however-war, revolution-knock these parties over like a
house of cards. On the other hand, organizations that have
reached real revolutionary clarity and consciousness really
develop their greatest strength in critical historic situations.
Then the philistine is astonished, and the left philistine is
exultantwithout understanding, however, that the "miracle" of
the successes was only possible through long and persevering
preparatory work, and that Marxian intransigence was the best
weapon in this preparatory work.
Splinters and chips fly in every big ideological struggle. The
centrists are in the habit of making use of this miserable material
to distract attention from what is important and decisive. Young
workers who want to think must learn to despise the maliciously
impotent gossip of the centrists. You must examine things to the
very bottom! The most important questions for the shaping of
proletarian revolutionists are at present the attitude toward war
and the Fourth International. You must pose these questions
before you in their full scope! We, Bolshevik-Leninists, issued
more than a year ago the pamphlet War and the Fourth
International.65 To become thoroughly acquainted with this
programmatic document is the first duty of every revolutionist
who wants to arrive at a position. Lose no time; study; reflect;
discuss honestly; strive incessantly for revolutionary clarity!
With fraternal greetings,
L. Trotsky
REPORT IN ARBEIDERBLADET66
Published July 26, 1935
In the Russian Bolshevik revolution of 1917, in the civil war

until 1920, and in the following decisive years for the Soviet
regime, there were two great leaders, only two who could truly be
called leaders: Lenin and Trotsky. There were many other leaders
and staff officers, one of whom-StaLin-has now even risen to
the level of personal dictator of the Soviet state (which Lenin
never was and Trotsky never wanted to be), but Lenin and
Trotsky were revolutionary leaders of a special kind.
Trotsky is currently convalescing at the home of editor Konrad
Knudsen near Honefoss,67 having recently arrived in Norway
after he was given permission by the Labor government. A staff
writer for A rbeiderbLadet, along with a few other party members,
visited the great former leader of the revolution.
Sick But Not Broken;

Big Book About Lenin on the Way
Trotsky is still rather weak and last week he had a relapse in

his illness. But he was not broken; his vitality was astonishing in
view of all he has gone through; he is a man who is still far from
having said his last word and who has gained new hope for his
health through his stay in Norway. In a few weeks Trotsky's
personal doctor is coming to Norway from Paris, and he, together
with a Norwegian doctor, will then thoroughly go over the patient
and make further plans for his treatment. It is hoped that in time
this will succeed in bringing back his health.
It is a memorable experience to speak with Trotsky. People may
differ in their appraisal of his deeds and his views, but few whose
knowledge entitles them to an opinion on the subject will deny
that he is one of history's truly great figures. He has been a great
man of action, but he is also a notable thinker. His books are
profound, yet at the same time written in a brilliant style. For
53
some time Tiden Norsk Forlag has been negotiating with

Trotsky's representative about the publication of a few of his
books in Norwegian, and this may be arranged. His three-volume
work on the Russian revolution has already become a classic and
has been published in large editions in a number of countries.
Trotsky is currently working, whenever he is able to, on a big
book about Lenin, and we discussed it.
"In my manuscript Lenin has now reached the age of twenty
three," says Trotsky. "About one-third is now completely
finished, and I have organized but not yet begun working on the
material for the remaining two-thirds. It will be one or two
volumes and at least 600 pages long."
Italo-Ethiopian Conflict Could Become

Prologue to New World War
The conversation touches upon the historic world events, which

Trotsky follows closely, but when it is a question of saying
anything for publication he is very cautious, since he feels
himself bound by the stipulations of his entry visa. Yet he can
express his opinion on questions of a general historical or
socialist nature, and in the course of the conversation we were
able to obtain statements of the greatest interest.
First is the danger of war in connection with Italy's campaign
in Ethiopia. Is it heading toward a new world war?
"It is very difficult to make any predictions," says Trotsky,
"but I would say yes, in the sense that I believe that the
prospective war between Ethiopia and Italy stands in the same
relation to a new world war as the B alkan War in 1 9 12 did to the
World War of 1914-18. Before there can be any new big war, the
powers will have to declare themselves, and in this regard the
Ethiopian-Italian war will define positions and indicate the
coalitions. It is impossible to say whether it will then take three,
four, or five years or more before the big war breaks out. We
should be prepared for a short rather than a long time."
War Between Japan and Soviet Union Soon?
"What exactly is the position of the Soviet Union?"

"The Soviet Union has its own d anger in the Far East. The
expansionist drive of Japanese militarism is very great. And the
present policy in Tokyo is quite unpredictable. A war between
Japan and the Soviet Union could-in spite of the latter's
Report in A rbeiderbladet 55
genuine desire for peace-break out within even a year's time.

Japan will perhaps succeed for a time in the beginning of such a
war. But Japan would inevitably lose, if only because of the
internal situation in the country. Indirectly, the Soviet Union's
diplomacy is currently a means of support for Italy, which is
leaning on France and the Soviet Union. In the international
arena, the government of the Soviet Union has become a
conservative power. It is for the status quo, against change. But it
has not lifted a finger for the status quo in Ethiopia. That is an
irony of history."
Trotsky's Work and Fate
Trotsky would not say any more about this subject, although it
was clear that he had definite opinions about lots of things. We
turn the conversation to the history of the Russian revolution and
his work in the revolution, and mention among other things the
myth, which some have attempted to give currency, that in
reality the Red Army was victorious not because of Trotsky but in
spite of Trotsky's leadership. Trotsky smiles at that and says:
"With some top circles in the Soviet Union it is just like with a
man who strikes it rich in America-he has to get himself a
family tree. When a new bureaucratic stratum comes to power it
creates its own genealogy and prehistory. The past is distorted
and all of its own advantages are put on display."
"I was a member of the Political Bureau from 1 9 17 to 1 927.68 At
the beginning of 1 928, I was exiled to Central Asia by an
administrative measure; I was there for one year, and in the
beginning of 1929 I was deported to Turkey. I remained there
until 1933, when Daladier's short-lived government gave me an
entry visa to France, where I stayed for two years."69
The World Advances All the Same
We observe that most of the Old Bolsheviks are now either dead
or in exile,70 and Trotsky says:
"Those who made the revolution never benefited from it. But
the world has made a little progress all the same. The difference
is that formerly, as in the French Revolution, the heads were cut
off the leaders of the revolution; now they are sent into exile in
Siberia and elsewhere. The new bureaucracy in the Soviet Union
is made up of new elements-in part old enemies of the October
Revolution. It is difficult for me to express myself on this; but it
was a truly Shakespearian scene that was acted out early this
year in London, when representatives of the English labor
movement went to the Soviet embassy in connection with the
imprisonment of Zinoviev and Kamenev.71 There stood the Soviet
ambassador, Maisky, who earlier had been a minister in
Kolchak's government,72 and explained that the two old Bol
shevik leaders were really counterrevolutionaries!
On Socialism, Planning, and Control
Trotsky did not want to say anything at the moment about the
current state of affairs in the Soviet Union, but some things of
prime interest were touched upon.
"The working people themselves must participate in the
management of the economy if it is to really be socialism, that is,
production and other economic activity for the benefit of the
people," says Trotsky. "It must not be that the bureaucrats
unilaterally make decisions and the people simply obey-in that
case the plans will not be corrected by those whom these plans
ostensibly should be serving. Under capitalism the correction
takes place-or more accurately, took place-through competi
tion. Under socialism that can only happen through workers' and
farmers' control. If that is not done, disproportions can develop
which can lead to unfortunate results . "
Great Technical Results i n Soviet Union,

But Still Not a Classless Society
As far as the Soviet Union was concerned, he saw that it had

achieved great technical results, but the people's standard of
living has not kept up with the technical achievements. There is
still no classless society there, and lately it has taken certain
steps away from the socialist goal. Social differentiation has
increased rather than diminished. The role played by the
bureaucracy continues to grow. It has formed a new nobility.
Economically speaking it is a question of the productivity of
labor. Socialism will ultimately triumph only when the productiv
ity of labor is higher than it is under capitalism. That is how
capitalism defeated feudalism. But the productivity of labor is
still higher in America and Europe than in the Soviet Union.
Trotsky did not want to say any more about that subject and he
refused to say anything about the present situation in the Soviet
Union. But in conclusion he had many nice things to say about
Report in Arbeiderbladet 57
Norwegian nature and Norwegian hospitality, and not least of all

the hospitality he is enjoying with the Knudsen family.
"In the short time I have been in Norway," says Trotsky, " I
have been completely captivated by the landscape, nature's
beauty and the people. I don't know if the so-called 'Aryan' race is
directly descended from Norway, but I must say that the tall,
strong figures and faces in which one reads such dignity make
the best impression upon a person. Nature-at least in the small
part of the country I have so far gotten to know-appears
fascinating and soothing. To anyone who is looking for rest and
recreation, who wants to engage in either intensive mental work
or sports, I would warmly recommend Norway."
WHO DEFENDS RUSSIA?
WHO HELPS HITLER?73
July 29, 1935
Jacquemotte, the pathetic little leader of the Belgian Stalinists,

has asked Walter Dauge, leader of the left wing of the Belgian
Socialist Party, if he would "march" in the event of a Hitler
attack on the Soviet Union.74 At one stroke the whole shallow
ness of this philistine mind is laid bare. What does "march"
mean in this connection? If Belgium, in alliance with France,
advances on Germany-certainly not for reasons of democracy or
of friendship for the Soviets, but for purely imperialist purposes
and if Dauge is eligible for military service, then he must march
along. He will also have to march, however, should Belgium
decide to adhere to an anti-Soviet war coalition. Should Belgium
remain neutral, Dauge will not be able to march. The very wise
Jacquemotte and his followers and co-workers in France,
Czechoslovakia, and elsewhere, simply forget that it is not for the
oppressed workers but for the oppressing bourgeoisie to decide
when and under what circumstances the dogs of war shall be
unleashed.
Vaillant-Couturier sought to settle this "small" point by
advancing the thesis: "We are a realistic party, a government
party."7S It is quite true that we are not anarchists. But it is
necessary to make a distinction between a proletarian and an
imperialist government. To become the government party in
reality, it is necessary to overthrow the powers-that-be by
revolutionary action and to organize our own Red Army. Then
and only then will we be able to decide if and for what purpose we
shall "march. " The Stalinist "theoreticians"-permit us to call
them that-more and more obscure the main question of the
conquest of power. More and more they place the defense of the
Soviets in the hands of the deadly enemy of the working class
the national bourgeoisie. That is the betrayal in its final
theoretical implications.
If we continue to promote the class struggle in France, Belgium,
Czechoslovakia, etc. , answer the Stalinists and their worshipers,
58
Who Defends Russia? 59
we will weaken the allies that the Soviet Union has made and so
harm the Soviet Union itself. Hitler will, as a result, be
strengthened whether we like it or not. We cannot tell when the
class struggle will lead to the conquest of power. Hitler, however,
may have won his war before that time has come. Hitler as the
ruler of Europe would delay or smash our fight altogether (in
France, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, etc.). To continue our class
struggle activities would actually strengthen Hitler.
This explanation-logical as it would like to be-is nothing
other than a repetition of the arguments the imperialists and
social patriots (i.e., social imperialists) always and invariably
invoked against their revolutionary opponents. Was not Lieb
knecht a lackey of the czar and Lenin an agent of the
Hohenzollerns?76 And so forth, without end.
You will remind me that there was no Soviet Union at that
time, and you are quite right. That fact proves only that the
ideology of social patriotism existed before the October Revolu
tion and that the greatest historical events have produced no
change in the specious shallowness of the social patriots.
German Social Democrats-not only the mercenary scoundrels,
but honest workers-said during the war: victory for the czar
means that his cossacks would dissolve, devastate, destroy our
party and our unions, p apers, and halls. The average French
worker likewise listened trustingly to the appeals of Renaudel,
Cachin, etc., to keep the Republic and democracy out of the hands
of the kaiser and his junkers.77 The Soviet state, for its part, did
not fall from the heavens. It came into existence only because of
action by the proletarian vanguard. To defend the Soviet Union
and rightly-we must defend the organizations of labor in
capitalist lands. These two tasks are politically the same, or in
any event closely connected. It is our undeniable duty to defend
the Soviet state as it is (with the theories of Doriot, Treint, etc., we
have nothing in common78), just as we defend any labor
organization, though led by the worst reformists, against fascism
and military reaction. The whole question is, however-how and
with what methods?
Marxists say: Only with those means which we have at our
disposal, which we can consciously utilize, that is, with the
methods of revolutionary class struggle in all belligerent
countries. Whatever the fortunes of war, the revolutionary class
struggle will, in the last analysis, yield the best results to the
workers. This applies to the defense of labor organizations and of
the democratic institutions of capitalist lands, no less than to the
defense of the Soviet Union. Our methods remain basically the
same. Under no circumstances or pretext can we transfer our

revolutionary task into the hands of our national bourgeoisie.
All this-the wise philistine retorts-may be very well "theoret
ically." But who will disagree that the carrying on of the class
struggle in France will strengthen Hitler's position and will
increase the possibility of a war outbreak and Hitler's chances of
victory in such a war? And is not fascist Germany the chief
danger for the Soviets? And would not the defeat of the Soviet
Union paralyze the development of the world revolution for
years?
This argument-again a slavish repetition of the old arguments
of Scheidemann, Wels, Vandervelde, de Man, Cachin, and
consorts79-is false all the way through. Touched by the wand of
Marxian criticism it falls to pieces.
Fascism is nothing other than the idea of the identity of
interest of the classes, carried to an extreme and invested with
mysticism. If the French, Belgian, and Czech workers ally
themselves with "their" bourgeoisie, the German workers are
inevitably driven thereby to rally around the Nazis. Social
patriotism can only be water in the millstream of racism. To
weaken Hitler, the fire of the class struggle must be set blazing. A
mighty movement of the workers in any nation of Europe would
do more to cripple racially insane militarism than all kinds of
combinations among the powers and with the Soviet Union.
Every alliance thus formed against Germany gives the race
fanatics more ammunition and drives antagonistic imperialist
states to Germany's side, especially since they are not concerned
with democracy or the Soviet Union but with the notorious
balance of power (Poland, Japan, E ngland, etc.).
If the proletariat of those lands allied with the Soviet Union
(for how long?) is to support its bourgeoisie in war, that political
line must begin in time of peace. For before it can be hoped to
prevent Hitler's victory, efforts must be made to ward off the war
itself. This means support of the anti-Hitler imperialist powers in
peacetime to sway the balance of power against him early
enough. This, however, signifies nothing more or less than the
complete abandonment of the class struggle. This was also the
purpose of the infamous declaration of Stalin.80 He approves,
now, in peacetime, the military crimes of the French-naturally
also of the Belgian and the Czechoslovakian-bourgeoisie. And
how could it be otherwise?
If we are to do nothing to weaken the imperialist allies of the
Soviet Union through the class struggle, that means naturally
that we must strengthen the confidence of the people in their rule.
What will we do then, when French, Belgian, Czechoslovakian

militarism, buttressed by their own proletariat, turn, in the course
of the war-a perfectly credible and possible development-to
direct their weapons against the Soviets? To delude ourselves
with the idea that in such a case we can strongly oppose them is
madness. The great masses do not make such sharp turns. The
power which we have helped militarism to gain will not be so
easily wished away. In such a case, we would have put ourselves
into the position of being not only passive but active agents in
the destruction of the Soviet Union.
The Stalinists hesitate, however, to draw the final conclusions
from their premises. In order to maintain their status in at least a
fake parliamentary opposition, they cry that there are fascists
among the army officers. Such an argument testifies only to the
entire hollowness and stupidity of Stalinist social patriotism. As
far as the argument of utilizing the antagonisms between the
imperialist powers goes, it is quite as feasible to play one group of
fascists against the other. As an ally of France, Mussolini now
also becomes an ally of the Soviet Union. The contradiction
between Germany and France is by no m eans that of democracy
vs. fascism, but rather that between a hungry and a sated
imperialism. This contradiction will remain, even should France
become fascist itself.
The readiness of the C ommunist Party of France to vote for the
imperialist army, if only it is "cleansed" of fascist elements,
proves that it has no m ore concern than Blum about the Soviet
Union , but that its only worry is about French "democracy." It
has set itself a lofty goal-to implant pure democracy in the
officer corps of the Versailles army (Versailles-in the sense of
the Commune as well as of the Versailles peace).81 How? Through
a government of Daladier. "Les soviets partout!" "Daladier au
pouvoir!" [Soviets everywhere! Daladier to power!] Why, however,
did the great democrat D aladier, who was war minister for two
years (1 932-34), do nothing to purge the army of fascists,
Bonapartists, and royalists?82 Could it be because Daladier had
not at that time been purified in the magic waters of the People's
Front?83 Could perhaps l'Humanite, with its depths of profound
wisdom and honesty, clarify this riddle for US?84 Could it also
answer: Why did Daladier capitulate at the first sign of pressure
from the forces of armed reaction in February 1934?85 May we
answer for them? It is because the Radical Socialist Party is the
most wretched, cowardly, and servile of all the parties of finance
capital. It is only necessary for Messrs. de Wendel, Schneider,
Rothschild, Mercier, and Company to put their foot down.86 The
Radicals will always bend the knee. Herriot first,87 then just a
little later, Daladier.
Let us assume that the People's Front should come to power
and as a demonstration (that is, for purposes of duping the
masses) should succeed in ousting some second-rank reaction
aries from the army and should dissolve (on paper) some of the
organized bandit gangs. What, fundamentally, would be
changed? The army-then as now-would remain the chief
imperialist weapon. The general staff of the army would continue
to be the staff of the military conspiracy against the toilers. In
wartime the most reactionary, determined, and ruthless elements
in the officer corps would gain the upper hand. The Italian and
German examples show that imperialist war is an excellent
school of fascism for army officers.
Further, what of those lands whose position toward the USSR
is not yet known, whose war stand is still a secret? The British
Labour and trade union movement is already paralyzing the
fight against its own imperialists on the ground that Great
Britain may be forced to come to the defense of the Soviet Union.
These political j ugglers naturally refer to Stalin, not only
successfully but properly. If the French Stalinists can promise to
"control" the foreign policy of their own imperialists, the British
Labourites can play the same game. And what is the Polish
proletariat to do? The Polish bourgeoisie is bound to France by an
alliance and entertains the closest friendship with Germany.
Whatever the pretext may be" civil peace (sacred union)88
always means the basest servility of the Socialists to imperial
ism, j ust at the time when it is performing its bloodiest and most
horrible work. The last war showed the results of patriotic belly
crawling. The leaders of the Social Democracy came out of the
school of "civil peace" completely crushed, politically annihilat
ed, without faith or courage, honor or conscience. The workers of
Germany had seized power after the war. But the leaders of the
Social Democracy gave the p ower back to the generals and the
capitalists. Had the leaders of French labor not come out of the
war as wretched political invalids, France would today be a land
of socialism.
The civil peace of 1 9 14-18 did not merely sentence the people of
the world to unheard-of sacrifices and burdens. It gave a rotting
capitalism a new lease on life for decades. The civil peace of 1 9 1 4-
1 8 in the interests of "one's own n ation" only paved the way for
the new imperialist war, which threatens the complete extermina
tion of the nations. Under whatever slogans the social patriots
may prepare for a new "civil peace" ("Defense of the fatherland,"
"Defense of democracy , " "Defense of the USSR"), the result of

this new betrayal will be the collapse of all modern culture.
Naturally, the Soviet bureaucracy wants to defend the USSR as

well as to build socialism. This it wishes to do, however, after its
own fashion, which is in gross contradiction to the interests of
the international and thereby also of the Russian proletariat.
This bureaucracy does not believe in the international revolution.
It sees only the dangers, difficulties, and drawbacks, not the
tremendous possibilities. Nor have Stalin's miserable yes-men in
France, Belgium, and the whole world one bit of faith in
themselves or in their parties. They do not regard themselves
and rightly so-as the leaders of the rebellious masses, but only
as the agents of Soviet diplomacy, before the forum of tl:1ese
masses . With this diplomacy, they stand or fall.
The Comintern bureaucracy is, therefore, organically incapable
of opposing the bourgeois patriots in tim e of war. That is why
cowardly wretches like C achin, Jacquemotte, Gottwald,89 cling to
every miserable excuse to hide their capitulation to the unleashed
floods of p atriotic "public opinion." Such a pretext-a pretext, not
a reason-they find in " defense of the Soviet Union." Doriot is of
the same political physiognomy as Cachin and Duclos90-a
product of the same school. It is interesting to see, therefore, how
easily he breaks with the idea of the defense of the Soviets and
substitutes for it "understanding with Hitler." It should be clear
to every St-Denis youngster that an understanding between the
French b ourgeoisie and Hitler must be directed against the Soviet
Union. Such a gentleman has only to dump the Stalinist
bureaucrats overboard immediately to turn his back on the
USSR. These politicians lack only the minor matter of a
backbone. Crawling on their bellies before the Stalin clique was
only training for their obeisance before their own bourgeoisie.
With that amazing lack of decency that characterizes them,
these people turn promptly to the attack on the revolutionary
internationalists and accuse us-of supporting Hitler. They forget
that Hitler can be conquered only by the German working class,
at present unorganized and crushed by the crimes of the Second
and Third Internationals. But it will rise again. To help it to its
feet again, to invigorate it, the international revolutionary
movement, especially in France, must be developed.
Every p atriotic declaration of Blum, Zyromsky, Thorez, etc.,91 is
new grist for racial theory (nationalism) and, in the last analysis,
aids Hitler. The uncompromising Marxian, Bolshevik line of the
world proletariat-in peace as in war-will scuttle the race
fanatics, for it will prove in action that the fate of mankind is

determined by the struggle of the classes and not of the nations.
Is it really necessary to prove this? The Third International
walking in the footsteps of the Second-has finally sidetracked
the class struggle for the " general" offensive against Hitler.
Hitlerism has only been helped by this retreat. Undeniable facts
and figures prove it: the growth of National Socialism [Nazism]
in Austria, the Saar plebiscite, the elections in Bohemia (German
Czechoslovakia). To fight fascism with nationalist weapons is
but to throw oil on the flames. The first real success for the forces
of proletarian revolution in France, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, or
any land, will sound in the ears of Hitler like the tolling of the
death bell. This ABC must be understood by anyone who wishes
to deal with the problems of socialism.
What the result of war may be-should the weakness of labor
permit its outbreak-we cannot say in advance. The fronts will
shift, national boundaries will be shattered. At the present stage
of the development of aviation, all borders will be violated, all
national territories will be laid waste. Only the most outspoken
reactionary (who often goes by the name Socialist or even
Communist) can, under these conditions, call upon labor to j oin
with "its" bourgeoisie in defense of "its" frontiers. The real task
of the workers is to use the war difficulties of the bourgeoisie in
order to overthrow it and abolish national boundaries, which
stifle industry and culture.
The bourgeoisie is strongest in the first period of the war. But
with every month of warfare , its strength diminishes. Labor's
vanguard, on the other hand, if it has taken care to maintain its
independence from the patriotic j ackals, will grow firmer and
stronger, not only every day but every hour. In the last analysis,
the fate of the war is not determined so much on the military
front as by the relationships of the proletariat and the bourgeoi
sie. Only the victorious revolution can mend the cares, the
miseries, and the dislocations of war. Not only fascism but
imperialism will thus receive its death blow. Not only will the
external foes of the Soviet Union thereby be defeated, but the
internal contradictions, which engender the barbarous dictator
ship of the Stalin clique, will be overcome. The proletarian
dicatorship will unite our dismembered, bled-dry continent, will
rescue a culture threatened with ruin, will establish the Soviet
United States of Europe. It will penetrate America and bring into
motion the oppressed masses of the East. All mankind will be
brought together into a socialist society and a harmonious
culture.
OEHLERISM AND
THE FRENCH EXPERIENCE92
August 11, 1935
To the National Committee

Workers Party of the U .S.
Dear Comrades:
I have received from Comrade Swabeck the motions and
minutes of your June plenum.93 I need not say that I have studied
these important documents with all the attention which they
merit. You have opened up a discussion on disputed questions.
The remarks I present here are my contribution to your discus
SIOn.
I wish to commence with an analysis of the motions of the
Oehler group because the documents of this group may be
regarded as the touchstone. The Oehler group proposes "the
condemnation of the orientation ofthe ICL. " The new orientation
is best represented by the participation of our French section in
the opportunist SFIO, which is a section of the Second Interna
tional.
Most of the European sections were at the beginning opponents
of the turn made in France. The French section was itself split on
this question . The initial objections offered were the following: (a)
It is an abdication of the slogan for the Fourth International. (b)
It is a formal capitulation before the reformists. (c) Our French
section will be unable to defend its ideas inside the SFIO. (d) Our
comrades will be demoralized, little by little, by their reformist
milieu.
We, the partisans of the entry into the SFI O , replied: All these
dangers exist but at the same time we have the opportunity to
combat them. We surely hope that our cadres are sufficiently
tempered , that our international control is sufficiently efficacious,
to assure that our French section remains faithful to its principles
and gains in influence within the SFIO. Such was the point of
65
departure of the discussion and of the experiment itself. Almost a

year has now gone by-and what a year!
The elementary duty of every Marxist is to draw the balance
sheet of the experiment. Has our French section lost any of its
clarity or its revolutionary vigor? Has it actually begun to use
reformist methods? Has it forsaken the struggle for the Fourth
International? Has it weakened its slogans? Has it drawn near to
the masses or, on the contrary, has it been isolated from them? It
seems incredible, yet it is nevertheless a fact: the Oehler group
does not even pose these questions. In its motions there is not the
slightest attempt to analyze and criticize the activity of our
French section. It condemns the turn itself (not the activity and
its results, but the turn) without regard for the realities of the
class struggle.
Now, every comrade who is acquainted with the facts and
documents must recognize that: (a) La Verite [paper of the GBL]
is the most revolutionary, the most Marxist p aper of our entire
international press-not because its editorial board is superior,
but because this little newspaper reflects the struggles of the
masses in an extremely tense situation. (b) The slogans of the
French Bolshevik-Leninists are all confirmed by events and have
found a great echo in the country. (c) The adult group, which has
hardly reached out to the provinces, secured more than 2,000
votes on a Marxist motion at the Mulhouse congress.94 (d) The
youth group dominates two of the most important sections, Seine
and Seine-et-Oise, i.e. , Paris and its environs, carrying with it
groups which only yesterday were hostile, like Fred Zeller, etc.95
Under the influence of our youth it is possible to count six or
seven thousand in the Socialist Party. (e) Through the medium of
the Socialist organizations, our comrades have secured far more
solid contact with Stalinist, trade union, and other circles. The
conquests which have been made outside the Socialist Party will
be revealed in the near future in a manner which will leave no
room whatever for doubt. (f) The international connections of our
French section are more solidly welded than ever and its struggle
in behalf of the Fourth International is being waged unremit
tingly.
Does Comrade Oehler not know these facts? Is he deliberately
closing his eyes, so that his formulas may remain intact? What
does such an attitude signify? In any case, it has nothing in
common with Marxism, which is not a game with formulas but
an analysis of realities. It would appear that Oehler does not
want revolutionary successes because they have arrived by the
Oehlerism and the French Experience 67
road which he opposed. Let the revolution perish, so long as

Oehler's prejudices triumph! What ideas does Oehler oppose to
the French experience? Must one never, under any conditions,
work in the reformist parties?
On the other hand, in the motion on the SP he recognizes the
necessity for "faction work in the Second and in the Third
Internationals. " Is it "normal" that a revolutionary party should
have its factions in the reformist parties? The faction is
subordinated to the statutes of the reformist party. Is this not
capitulation? If the work of the faction goes well, it can perhaps
become two or three times larger than an independent organiza
tion. Wouldn't this be capitulation by two-thirds or three-quarters
of one organization? Oehler can reply: But an independent
organization directs the faction and thereby assures a correct
policy. But our French section has been and is under the control
of our international organization. It seems that Oehler forgets
this circumstance. Or is it that that control has not been
satisfactory? Why hasn't Oehler then indicated the faults
committed by our French section? Why does he deprive it of his
criticism and advice? Because he wants to know nothing, either
of the successes or of the errors of our French section. He is like a
man who does not want to allow his daughter to marry a wholly
excellent man who has the misfortune of having been born out of
wedlock. Bowever, the entry into the SFIO is based on absolutely
the same plan as the formation of factions in the Second and
Third Internationals. These facts show that we do not yet have
revolutionary parties, fully formed and strong in the confidence
of the masses. It is a question of building such parties, and to
succeed it is necessary to apply the method which corresponds to
the given social and political conditions and not to suprahistori
cal formulas.
In any case, whoever speaks of the capitulation of the French
section before the reformists is making use of slanders for
purposes of factional struggle.
The Oehler group proposed to reject the draft of the Open Letter
presented by the International Secretariat. To this text he
opposed six lines which are the vague titles of unwritten
chapters. We would all have been glad to have a better draft, but
this manner of rejecting as a whole a text drawn up by our
international center and offering in its stead a few phrases
without content is absolutely unworthy of a Marxist. Light
mindedness and superficiality are not revolutionary virtues.
The Oehler group proposes to place under the Open Letter a

number of different signatures, that of the SAP included, but
excluding that of our French section. What the SAP is, the
American comrades now know sufficiently well from the article
beginning on page 1 29 of the July issue of the New International
["Centrist Alchemy or Marxism?"]. You will receive almost
simultaneously with this letter a translation of the article of
Comrade Schmidt, chairman of the Dutch party (RSAP), which
shows that the SAP is now carrying on a fierce struggle in our
Dutch party against the Fourth International. The leaders of our
Young Socialist comrades in France have been expelled from the
SFIO because they were carrying on a struggle for the Fourth
International. But Comrade Oehler insists upon the signature of
the SAP and rejects the signature of the French section.
But he goes still further, in taking up the defense of the
International Bureau of Stockholm.96 In his motion he affirms
that "The Stockholm-Oslo Youth Bureau, with which the Spar
tacus Youth League of the U.S. is affiliated, is the only youth
organization standing for the Fourth International, and must be
preserved and developed further theoretically and organizational
ly." Now in fact, the whole crisis of the Stockholm Bureau is due
to the fact that the maj ority of the Bureau is openly hostile to the
Fourth International.
We know the attitude of the SAP. The Swedish group is even
further to the right. It has handed over its mandate to the
Norwegian group Mot-Dag, which consists of about a hundred
reformist intellectuals who have fully approved b ourgeois
ministerialism and the declaration of Stalin.97 The proposal to
delegate to the Stockholm Bureau a representative of the Dutch
youth and a representative of the French youth is rej ected by
Oehler as "arbitrary. " He evidently believes that Mot-Dag is far
better fitted for a place in the Bureau. Oehler is afraid of a split
with avowed opportunists and declared enemies of the Fourth
International. But he has no fear of a split with the Bolshevik
Leninists. He calls for the signature of Vereecken, who broke
from our international organization, but rejects the signature of
the French section, which has remained faithful to it, j ust as,
naturally, he rejects the signature of our Belgian section, which is
now making considerable progress.
How is one to explain the fact that a representative of the
intransigent "left wing" like Oehler is suddenly transformed into
a defender of the SAP and the opportunist maj ority of the
Stockholm Bureau against the sections of the Bolshevik-
Oehlerism and the French Experience 69
Leninists? On what side of the barricades is Oehler, anyway? It

will be necessary to clarify this point because we have already
witnessed the case of Bauer, who assumed the defense of the
Fourth International against our "capitulation" before the
Second International and ended up as a member and agent of the
SAP in its miserable struggle against the Fourth International.98
In the same motion Oehler demands that the Socialist youth of
Spain be represented in the Bureau. But those youth also belong
to a party of the Second International. They are infinitely less
advanced than our French youth. They have declared themselves
for the Fourth International without drawing from their declara
tion the necessary consequences. We are all naturally ready to do
everything possible to draw them to the Fourth International, but
the simple phrase in Oehler's motion is not enough for this. It
requires work. The crisis in the Stockholm Bureau is at hand. By
rejecting the candidacy of a French delegate, which is a real and
dependable candidacy, in favor of a Spanish candidacy which is
purely imaginary and speculative, Oehler displays not only his
animosity for the French section, which is on the line of b attle,
but also his incredible lightmindedness on questions upon which
our whole struggle for the Fourth International depends.
I reserve the right to add to this letter one or two others in the
nearest possible future.
Fraternally,
Leon Trotsky
A CANCER IN THE WORKERS PARTY99
August 12, 1935

Workers Party of the U.S.
Dear Comrades:
I mentioned in my first letter that at the time of the French
"turn" a large majority of the European sections opposed it. But
the experience itself has been so eloquent, so striking, that an
overwhelming maj ority of the comrades have since recognized
the justice of the turn. The Naville group has not only entered the
SFIO but has gone back into the Bolshevik-Leninist Group.loo
The unity of the former League is fully reestablished, if we do not
count the insignificant group of Lhuiller. It is not, however, the
unity of the former League which is decisive, but its new role.
From a propaganda group with some two hundred members,
youth included, it has transformed itself into a revolutionary
factor directly and indirectly exercising an influence upon the
working class movement of the country. One can say without the
least exaggeration that the specific gravity of our French section
in the working class movement in France is far greater than the
specific gravity of the Dutch or American parties in the labor
movements of their respective countries. This means that
progress has been made in France. The situation has changed not
only quantitatively but qualitatively.
The fate of all Europe, and to certain degree the fate of the
whole world, is being decided for the present in France. This
objective fact doubles and triples the importance of the work of
our French section. What is the elementary duty of all the other
sections? To give their fullest attention to the activity of the
Bolshevik-Leninist Group in France, to solidarize with it, and to
extend to it material and moral support. This international duty
is all the more imperative and urgent in view of the fact that the
reformist bureaucracy-hand in hand with the Stalinist clique,
70
A Cancer in the Workers Party 71
which is sparing neither effort nor money for this purpose-has

embarked upon a war of extermination against the Bolshevik
Leninist Group. A new chapter is opening. This year of work in
the SFIO is opening new opportunities for an independent
revolutionary party. All the comrades of the Bolshevik-Leninist
Group agree with this. Naturally, it is necessary to know how to
act, and also how to maneuver, in order to create an independent
party in the most favorable possible circum stances. This is the
task of the next period.
Now, instead of supporting our French section with all its
strength, the Oehler group occupies itself in belittling, misrepre
senting, and even slandering 'our French comrades. I do not at all
desire to sharpen the atmosphere of the discussion in the WP, but
I must state frankly that the attitude of Oehler and his confreres
looks very much to us like the attitude of strikebreakers.
In my letter to the Polish comrades I briefly characterized the
first successes of our Belgian section (Lesoil). lol I underlined the
fact that the left wing of the Socialist Party has come, more or
less, under the influence of our comrades, or at least of our ideas,
throughout the whole country, excepting Brussels. Brussels is the
only city in which the local section of the former League was
under the influence of Vereecken and remained with him after the
split.102 We have here, ' then, an experiment that is almost
chemical in its clarity. In the very center of Vereecken's activity,
the left wing of the Socialist Party has fallen completely under
the influence of Dr. Marteau, the Stalinist agent in the POB.
Could there be any more striking proof of the absolute sterility of
sectarianism? While Vereecken recruits with the utmost difficulty
here and there a handful of young intellectuals and young,
isolated workers, the group of Lesoil (our section) is actively
influencing the development of the left wing in the Socialist
Party and the Young Socialist Guards.
I do not at all mean by this that the American comrades must
attempt a simple reproduction of the French or Belgian expe
rience in the United States. The difference in existing conditions
is obvious to the naked eye. The fusion of two independent
organizations has opened up great possibilities for you. N o
tendency among you proposes entry into the Socialist Party. A s
part o f your task a s an independent organization, it i s a question
of knowing how to influence, directly and systemically, the
development of the left wing in the Socialist Party. During the
first months of 1 9 17, the Bolshevik Party represented a far more
considerable force than the Workers Party does today. Neverthe-
less, the Bolshevik Party maintained continuous relations with

the left wing of the Mensheviks, and on occasion even drew up
common electoral slates in the municipal elections in Petrograd
with the left Mensheviks (Larin groUp).103 At the same time, in
agreement with Lenin, I remained in the organization of the
Internationalists to bring them as a whole toward fusion with the
Bolshevik Party. A fusion congress was convoked in July 1 9 1 7 . In
April, Lenin spoke at the Menshevik conference. At the fusion
congress in July a representative of the left wing of the
Menshevik congress delivered a speech of congratulations , etc.
Bolshevik intransigence is indissolubly bound to an understand
ing of the real process in the workers ' organizations, to the ability
to influence this process, to a flexibility in maneuvering with
regard to g""r oupin gs and even individuals.
On the other hand, each sectarian wants to have his own labor
movement. By the repetition of magic formulas he thinks to force
an entire class to group itself around him. But instead of
bewitching the proletariat. he always ends up by demoralizing
and dispersing his own little sect.
I cannot express an opinion from this distance on the practical
course to take with regard to the Socialist and Stalinist parties.
From Europe, unfortunately, I see far less of America than
Comrade Oehler, from America, sees 6f E urope. That is why I
prefer to remain prudent rather than offer counsel which might
prove unwise. But I am absolutely in agreement with Comrades
Cannon and Shachtman when they say that a Leninist policy
toward the Socialist Party and its left wing " c annot be pursued in
an atmosphere of hysteria over the nonexistent danger that a
realistic consideration of the dynamics of development in the
Socialist Party represents the preparation of capitulation to the
SP. " 1 04
I have read with attention the minutes of your plenum and with
a certain horror I have read of your Control C ommission.lo5 One
seems to breathe in a somewhat nightmarish atmosphere when
one reads of the suspicions and rumors directed against comrades
who have long fought for the ideas of the proletarian revolution
ary struggle. Such methods can paralyze and demoralize the
party unless they are at once brought to an end by the will of all.
How does it happen that Comrades Oehler, Stamm, and others
take recourse to such means ? 1 06 We have had in France an
analogous case with B auer, who, not content with a political
struggle against the "turn," suddenly became an inexhaustible
source of suspicions, accusations, and even unbelievable slanders
A Cancer in the Workers Party 73
directed against all of us. He was, however, an honest and sincere

man, devoted to socialism. His misfortune is that he is a sick
sectarian. Such a man can remain tranquil and friendly so long
as the life of the organization continues to revolve in familiar
circles. But woe be it if events bring about a radical change! The
sectarian no longer recognizes his world. All reality stands
marsh aled against him and, since the facts flout him, he turns
his back on them and comforts himself with rumors, suspicions,
and fantasies. He thus becomes a source of slan ders without
being, by nature, a slanderer. He is not dishonest. He is simply in
irreconcilable conflict with reality.
Comrades Weber and Glotzer accuse the Cannon group of
proceeding too rudely and bureaucratically against Oeh1er.107 I
cannot express an opinion on this charge, since I have not h ad
the opportunity to follow the development of the struggle.
Hypothetically, I can concede the possibility of a certain
hastiness on the part of the leading comrades . It would naturally
be a mistake to desire to organizationally liquidate an opposition
group before the overwhelming maj ority of the p arty has had the
chance to fully understand the inconsistency and sterility of that
group. Leaders are often impatient in seeking to remove an
obstacle in the path of the p arty's activity. In such cases the
party can and must correct the precipitateness of the lead ers,
since it is not only the leaders who educate the party but also the
party that educates the leaders. Herein lies the salutary dialectic
of democratic centralism.
But Comrades Weber and Glotzer are decidedly wrong when
they place on the same plane the "mistakes" of Oehler and the
mistakes of C annon. Sectarianism is a cancer which threatens
the activity of the WP, which p aralyzes it, envenoms discussions,
and prevents courageous steps forward in the life of the workers'
organizations. I should like to hope that a surgical operation will
not be necessary. But precisely in order to avoid expulsions, it is
necessary to strike pitilessly at the Oehler group by a decision of
an overwhelming maj ority . This is the preliminary condition of
all possible future successes for the Workers Party. We all want it
to remain independent, but before all and above all, independent
of the cancer which is eating at its vitals.
Fraternally,
Leon Trotsky
PREFACE TO P.J. SCHMIDT'S ARTICLE
ON HOLLAND l o 8
August 12, 1935
The article by Comrade Schmidt, chairman of the Dutch party,

is of the greatest importance. The old asp was closely tied to the
SAP.109 The heads of these two organizations made the same
criticisms of us many times. Both organizations signed the
Declaration of Four with us at one time. But after that their
development proceeded in different directions.
The asp broke definitively with the philistines and cowards of
the de Kadt clique after the shock connected with the Jordaan
events. It unified with our Dutch section to take up the struggle
for the Fourth International . The SAP renounced its signature
and directed its activity with hostility against the left, particular
ly against the work for the Fourth International. The essential
points in this regard have been made in the article on centrist
alchemy. That article concludes by stating that the work for the
Fourth International must be carried on without the SAP and
against the SAP. Amazingly this prediction, which contains a
value judgment about the SAP, is now taken up by the latter as a
pretext for working against the Fourth International. The
absurdity of this "argument" is moreover sufficiently demonstrat
ed by Comrade Schmidt.
The facts and documents presented by Comrade Adolphe in a
short document l l O show convincingly that for two years the ICL
showed the greatest patience and goodwill toward the SAP , that
is, the greatest indulgence toward its centrist weaknesses, in
order not to close off the possibility of further collaboration.
Many times in the course of those two years, for example, Bauer
personally asked me in letters to finally break with the centrists
and incorrigible philistines of the SAP. Despite our patience and
our truly exaggerated indulgence toward centrist susceptibility,
we have subsequently been accused by various individuals of
lacking flexibility toward the SAP. We have often heard such
criticisms from comrades of the asp as well.
74
Preface to P.J. Schmidt's A rticle 75
Thus Schmidt's article has the greatest demonstrative value. It

shows that even with the best intentions of collaborating, if one
has revolutionary principles, nothing can be done with the SAP,
or at least with its present leadership.
The SAP, as is well known, spares all criticism of its allies on
the right. It provides their left flank with a defense. But at the
moment when the RSAP is taking a decisive practical step
toward the Fourth International, the SAP not only launches a
violent criticism against the leadership of this organization, but
starts doing faction work inside its "sister p arty" to tear it away
from the Fourth International. Here we see again a confirmation
of our analysis: the SAP fights only with the left; with the right it
knows only accommodation. Thus it produces a document to
show unequivocally its centrist-conservative, rightward-facing
character.
The most important section of this in any case important
article of Comrade Schmidt is the characterization of the
activity-or, more precisely, the inactivity-of the lAG. Comrade
Schmidt is not a "malicious Trotskyist" and poisoned opponent
of this organization; on the contrary, he is one of its founders and
is still at present its general secretary. But he proves that this
"Labor Community" is not a community and thus accomplishes
no labor. That we foresaw and predicted. The working class
cannot be served by fictions . On the contrary, fictions must be
swept away in order to clear the path toward the real Inter
national.
It is a shame, the forces we expended for the sake of discussion
with the SAP, a good-hearted conciliator would say. We have an
opposite viewpoint. The struggle against the SAP, that is, against
its vague character and vulgar pacifism, against the ambiguity of
its formulations and its actions, is an important preparatory
school for all the tendencies and organizations moving toward
the Fourth International. We are convinced that the RSAP can
only gain clarity, cohesion, and fighting capacity in its struggle
against the SAP. Moreover, this struggle will also benefit
elements in the SAP that are capable of developing. As for us, the
hostile and often slanderous writings of the SAP against us will
not at all prevent us from waging a common struggle for the
Fourth International together with the revolutionary wing of this
party, if it actually becomes a political force.
Comrade Schmidt also expresses himself in critical terms in
relation to the ICL. His criticism concerns, as he himself says,
tactical and organizational questions, and not principled ones.
We do not want to take up here his passing remarks, which we

consider erroneous. On the whole we consider our organization
only as a constituent part of the Fourth International, which is
being built, and if we defend our ideas rather forcefully we are
also ready to learn assiduously from our allies. The whole history
of the workers' movement shows that only those who put a
certain value on their ideas are able to learn.
AN APPEAL
TO OEHLERITE COMRADES l l l
August 13, 1935

Workers Party of the U.S.
Dear Comrades:
I send you herewith a copy of Revolution-which indeed
breathes the very spirit of revolution.1l2 You will note that the
Executive Committee of the Young Socialists of the Seine,
expelled from the [Socialist] party, retains the support not only of
Paris but of other sections of the country. You will see that it
remains altogether faithful to our banner and that it is carrying
on a vigorous campaign against social patriotism and class
collaboration.
This little issue (a special edition), devoted to the revolt at
Toulon, Brest, and Ie Havre, was ordered seized by the police. But
five thousand copies were distributed and the police succeeded in
getting only two . Our Bolshevik-Leninist Group put up posters in
Paris for a general strike and against the "sacred union. " These
posters were torn down simultaneously and systematically by
Stalinists, fascists, and police.
I hope that you will republish in the New Militant or Young
Spartacus [the parts] which I have marked with red pencil. I also
call your attention to the articles on page 2-"The Entente
Continues" and "To Members of the CP." I ask you to show this
paper to every comrade who declares his solidarity with Oehler. I
would then like to see if he continues to accuse our French
comrades of capitulation and treason.
Oehlerite comrades! Carry out a turn of 180 degrees in your
attitude on the French question! Get to work to tell the American
workers of the courage and devotion with which the Bolshevik
Leninists of France are conducting their struggle. We will gladly
forget unmerited reproaches and false accusations. You will
77
again find your place of combat in our international ranks. But if

you persist in your completely untenable attitude, you will be lost
for a long time to come for the revolutionary movement.
Fraternally,
Leon Trotsky
LETTER TO THE GERMAN
C OMMIS SION 1 1 3
August 19, 1935
Dear Comrades:
I very rarely get to read German newspapers nowadays. I get
my information about German domestic affairs mostly from
foreign papers. Thus I have considerable reservations about
approaching German domestic problems. Moreover, these prob
lems are in themselves quite unique. They are, so to speak, on the
agenda of the working class for the first time. Therefore, we
must-or so it seems to me at least-conduct this discussion with
the utmost consideration for opposing views. Otherwise comrades
can easily be discouraged from expressing their own views. Thus,
what I have to say in the following lines can have no more than a
tentative character.
1 . Directing fire against the SAP and elements friendly to the
SAP is the precondition for the further development of the
German section. The SAP is conducting open warfare against the
Fourth International. It is trying to undermine the Dutch section.
The SAP leadership must be treated like strikebreakers. Any
flirtation with SAP tendencies and elements like the Oehlerites
must be sharply castigated.
2. I cannot agree with what is said about our tasks in the
factories in section thirteen of the Emigre Committee's theses. It
is precisely in periods of the deepest counterrevolution that work
in the factories offers our greatest opportunity. In every plant
there are certainly groups of old Social Democratic workers, and
even old Communists, who know each other well, trust each other
completely, and can make their minds known to each other with
no more than a casual gesture. They are suspicious of everyone
new, every outsider, but they trust each other completely. If we
can gain entrance to their ranks, we will find a favorable milieu,
protection from police agents, and a base for our further
activities.
79
Thus we must orient toward work in the plants_ However, since

we are very weak, we should concentrate for a time on one plant
or another until we establish a firm footing and from there gain
entrance into other plants by utilizing the connections of the old
workers . Otherwise we run the danger, as a purely propagandistic
group, of overlooking the most important, the most decisive
processes in the working class and of letting events take us by
surprise .
Section fifteen addresses itself in very general terms to the
necessity of combining illegal with legal work, and section
sixteen rejects "ready-made formulas" for this task.
If illegal work is to consist of more than reading newspapers, it
requires a sympathetic milieu. This can only be found in the
plants. From this vantage point the opportunities for combining
legal and illegal work can be gradually learned and extended in
practice.
Sections seventeen and eighteen deal with the question of the
Fourth International and defeatism. At present the war question
provides the best avenue for successfully raising the question of
the Fourth International. Here too, we must above all ridicule the
SAP's charlatanry-worldwide struggle for peace, disarmament,
democratic control of armaments, etc. If we annihilate left
_ pacifism, then pacifism in general is finished. The question of
defeatism must now be posed very concretely. The revolutionary
German worker has absolutely no desire to become the tool of
French imperialism either, and Stalinism is pushing in this
direction . The Piecks, Cachins, etc . , can only frighten the German
workers away from defeatism. 1 l 4 The defeatist-minded German
worker will have to seek his cothinkers elsewhere-and they can
only be the Bolshevik-Leninists. This is how we can recruit to the
Fourth International .
3. O n the church question-I think I can best get to the essence
of the matter if I begin with the following quotation from the
remarks of Comrade Dubois [Ruth Fischer] in the commission
meeting of July 1 5 : "Dubois: Can't understand how Nicolle
[Erwin Wolf] can reconcile the terribly radical slogan 'Down with
the Radical ex-ministers' [in France] with the slogan 'Support for
the church in Germany' . "
O f course, supporting the church i s out o f the question. For us it
can only be a question of whether or not we support the political
struggle of C atholics and Protestants to remain Catholics and
Protestants and to act as such. The answer to this question is yes.
It goes without saying that we do not in the process commit
Letter to the German Commission 81
ourselves to supporting religion and the church, but rather

emphasize, insofar as possible, our opposition to religion and the
church.
However it is not clear to me what that has to do with the
slogan "Down with the Radical scoundrels" (not just the ex
ministers). This slogan is nothing more than the demand to break
the class-collaborationist front. Since the reformists and the
Stalinists refuse to carry out this break, they will be compromised
in the eyes of the workers. H ence the slogan "Bourgeois Radicals
out of the People's Front" is a completely correct Marxist slogan
at the present time.
Let us suppose, and this is not so difficult to do, that tomorrow
the [French] fascists begin to storm Freemason temples or smash
Radical newspapers (and this has already occurred episodically).
It goes without saying that the workers will take to the streets to
help defend the Freemason temples. But what is Freemasonry? It
too is a kind of church charged with making the free-thinking
petty bourgeoisie pliant to the interests of high finance. C an we
support Freemasonry? No, never. We can and must, however,
defend its right to exist against the fascist attacks, with gun in
hand if necessary. To be capable of this, the working class must
stay revolutionary-minded and ready to fight. However, the
People's Front makes this impossible . For this reason it is
necessary to drive the Radical bourgeoisie out of the People's
Front to be able to defend even Freemasonry, should the occasion
arise. There isn't the slightest contradiction here. If we clear up
this misunderstanding thoroughly, then, I believe, we can also
throw some light on the German church question.
In modern society, the church follows the interests of finance
capital, that is, of the ruling power. But its sphere of influence
remains primarily the petty bourgeoisie and the workers under
petty-bourgeois influence, their wives, etc. Among the workers,
the function of the comforting, consoling church has long since
been assumed by the Social Democracy, which has supplanted
the church to a considerable extent. The petty bourgeoisie,
subjected to ever-increasing pressure, cannot do without the
church, insofar as it remains the petty bourgeoisie. That is the
essence of the present conflict in Germany. Incredible internaJ
contradictions, ones which are immeasurably deeper than the
ones in Italy, and which are becoming continually worse, drive
the state to higher and higher levels of concentration . The deified
fascist state cannot and will not tolerate competition. National
Socialism wants to absorb religion and make the state into a god.
But since the furiously rearming fascist state subjects the petty
bourgeoisie to continually increasing pressure, the petty bourgeoi
sie cannot forego the mystical consolation of the church for the
wounds inflicted by the state. Socially speaking, it is only a
question of the division of labor between church and state. Every
true-believing petty bourgeois is inwardly torn by this division of
labor, which has become a political conflict. Alas! Two souls war
within his breast. The task is to stir up this conflict and above all
to direct it against the state.
The leading strata of the bourgeoisie are naturally not standing
on the sidelines. They let the Hitler gang take power, but the
fascists' adventurism gives them constant cause for concern.
Hindenburg's waverings over appointing Hitler are still a symbol
of the attitude of these strata. 1 1 5 They regard the church as an
eternal institution (as Lloyd George put it, the power station for
all political, i.e., ruling, p arties).lls They regard the Nazis,
however, only as an emergency aid. Hence they encourage the
church struggle and at the same time, along with the church
fathers, they try to remain within the bounds of "reason." When
we talk about "support" for this struggle, that means support
first of all against the Nazi state and secondly against those
strata of the ruling classes which simultaneously stir up the
struggle and retard it in order to retain Hitler's respect.
Slogans like " Separation of church and state" and "Separation
of school and church" are of course correct in themselves and
should be raised also when the opportunity arises. But these
slogans don't really hit the nail on the head. For what is at issue
is the right of Catholics and Protestants to consume their
religious opium without having their existence threatened or
prejudiced-regardless of whether the church as such is separated
from the state. It is first of all a matter of freedom of conscience,
then of equal rights , regardless of faith (pagan, Catholic,
Protestant, etc.), then of the right to form organizations (Catholic
youth organizations , etc.).
The argument over the word unconditional support seems to me
more a matter of semantics. 1 1 7 Naturally no one wishes to suggest
that we should support every demand raised by the church
oriented opposition, e.g., extension of religious instruction in the
schools, or increasing the state subsidy to the church, etc. I took
the word unconditional to mean that we have to fulfill our
obligation toward this oppositional movement without placing
any conditions on the organizations involved. This must be done
as a matter of course. What conditions could we raise in the
Letter to the German Commission 83
present situation and what opposition party would accept them?

The task is simply to find real and effective ways and means to
intervene in the struggle to encourage and extend the religious
democratic opposition and to lend aid to the young Catholics
especially the workers-in their struggle (and not to the Nazi
police, which wants to "destroy" the church organizations), etc.
Similarly, in Russia, we always came to the defense of the
Armenian church in its struggle for autonomy and supported the
struggle of the various peasant and petty-bourgeois sects against
the state-integrated Orthodox church-and at times we had great
success in this.
It is highly likely that the slumbering forces of the proletariat
will get a rousing shock from this awakening opposition to the
fascist state, an opposition which has a petty-bourgeois social
base. Naturally it is not a sure thing. It would be if there were a
strong and sagacious revolutionary p arty on the scene. But there
isn't. We are just in the beginning stages. We must do everything
that lies within our power. Above all this question has
considerable educational value for our cadres, who have main
tained a purely propagandistic orientation for perhaps too long.
A turn seems absolutely necessary to me. The church struggle
can not only be a place to start; it can also create better
conditions.
THE COMINTERN' S LIQUIDATION
CONGRESS 1 1 8
August 23, 1935
The Seventh Congress of the Comintern, which at the writing

of these lines still had not finished its work, will sooner or later
go down in history as the liquidation congress. E ven if all its
participants do not today recognize the fact, they are all-with
that obligatory unanimity which in general has characterized the
Third International over recent years-busy in practice with the
liquidation of the program, principles, and tactical methods
established by Lenin, and are preparing the complete abolition of
the Comintern as an independent organization.
The Third International arose directly out of the imperialist
war. It is true that long before it, widely different tendencies had
been struggling within the Second International; but even the
furthest left of these, represented by Lenin, was far from the
thought that the revolutionary unity of the world working class
would have to be created by a complete break with the Social
Democracy. The opportunist degeneration of the workers' parties,
closely connected with the period of the flowering of capitalism at
the end of the last and the beginning of the present century, was
completely revealed only at the moment when the war bluntly
posed the question: With the national bourgeoisie or against it?
Political development m ade a sudden leap in 1914; to use Hegel's
phrase, the accumulation of quantitative changes suddenly
acquired a qualitative character.l 1 9
The extent t o which the sharp turn t o patriotism by the sections
of the International seemed at first completely unexpected can be
seen perhaps most clearly from the example of Lenin. In the
years before, more than once he had had to criticize the German
Social Democracy; but invariably he considered it his party. And
even when, in Switzerland, he received a fresh number of
Vorwaerts announcing that the Social Democratic fraction in the
Reichstag had voted Wilhelm Hohenzollern credits for the war, he
84
The Comintern 's Liquidation Congress 85
declared with complete confidence to a circle of friends that this

issue had been forged by the German general staff to prove the
fictitious unanimity of the German people and to frighten the
enemy. And when there was no longer any room for comforting
illusions, the conclusions Lenin drew from the catastrophe were
all the more decisive and categorical. The Social Democratic
International was broken, its individual sections were in the
service of the national general staffs, a new International must
be constructed-this was Lenin's program right from the first
days of the war. From then on, parliamentary and trade unionist
leaders of the workers' organizations seemed in his eyes merely
agents of militant imperialism inside the working class . He
proclaimed the break with them as the first condition for further
revolutionary work. The new International, purged of opportun
ism, must become an organization for civil war against
imperialism. Lenin rejected the very name of Social Democracy,
calling it a dirty shirt which must be changed for a clean one.
Reconsidering the theoretical bases of reformism in the light of
the new experience, Lenin above all emphasized the theory of the
state. The leaders of the Second International considered that the
democratic state is an autonomous institution, suspended above
classes, and consequently capable of serving different, even
opposite, historical goals. The problem consisted for them in
gradually, step by step, filling "pure" democracy with a new
economic content. Jaures, the most inspired representative of
reformism, preached: "The Republic must be socialized."120 The
idealization of democracy inevitably led to idealization of the
democratic p arties of the bourgeoisie. Cooperation with them was
presented as a necessary condition for systematic "progress. "
If, i n Germany, with its tempestuous economic development
and backward political development, the democratic parties faded
before they managed to bloom, then in conservative France, with
its more stable intermediate classes and the traditions of the
Great Revolution, the Radical Party continued to occupy a most
important, by a superficial view even a decisive, position in the
political life of the Republic. The theory of pure democracy as an
arena of uninterrupted progress led in France directly to the bloc
of the Socialists with the Radicals. This question became for
decades the touchstone for the workers' movement. Jaures stood
for an alliance of all "pure republicans" for struggle against the
"reaction . " Guesde, on the other hand, supported class struggle
against all the parties of the bourgeoisie, including its treacher
ous wing. l21 This antagonis m at times took on a very sharp
character, but in the- last analysis, in its practical consequences,

it did not go beyond the limits of bourgeois democracy. In spite of
all his theoretically irreconcilable formulas, Guesde in 1914 spoke
for the defense of the Third Republic from "Prussian militarism,"
and unexpectedly for others-and perhaps for himself-became
minister of national defense. In Lenin's eyes, his former comrade
in-arms-and even to some extent his teacher-became just as
much a traitor to internationalism as the infamous Scheidemann.
The main force of Lenin's theoretical critique was now directed
against the theory of pure democracy. In his innovations he
appeared as a restorer; he cleansed of admixtures and falsifica
tions, and revived in all its uncompromising theoretical purity,
Marx and Engels's doctrine of the state as a tool of class
oppression. To the myth of pure democracy he counterposed the
reality of bourgeois democracy, grown on the foundation of
private property and transformed by the course of development
into a tool of imperialism. The class structure of the state,
determined by the class structure of society, excluded, according
to Lenin, the possibility of the proletariat's taking power within
the framework of democracy and with its methods. An opponent
armed to the teeth cannot be defeated by methods dictated by the
opponent himself, if, in addition, he also remains the supreme
arbiter of the struggle. The advance of the socialist proletariat
must inevitably lead to the revolutionary or counterrevolutionary
collapse of democracy. As soon as the question passes from
secondary points of parliamentary reform to the question of
capitalist property, all the p arties of the bourgeoisie, including
the most "left" ones, inevitably j oin the most powerful nucleus of
the ruling class, namely, finance capital. The perspective of
peaceful progress or democratic socialization is revealed from this
point of view as pure utopia. The preparation for revolution
demands a simultaneous break not only with the bourgeois
radicals but, as we already know, also with the democratic
reformists in the working class itself.
It would be a fundamental error to draw from what has been
said the conclusion that Lenin ignored the petty bourgeoisie, in
particular the peasantry, as a political factor. On the contrary, he
considered the ability of the workers' party to lead behind it the
petty-bourgeois masses of town and country as a necessary
condition for revolutionary victory, and not only in Russia and
the countries of the colonial E ast, but to a considerable extent
also in the highly developed capitalist metropolitan countries.
However, in the so-called middle classes he strictly distinguished
between the economically privileged upper layers and the

oppressed lower ones-the parliamentary activists and the
electoral sheep. To achieve a militant alliance of the proletariat
with the petty bourgeoisie, he considered it necessary in the first
place to purge the workers' ranks of reformists, and secondly to
free the small people of town and country from the influence of
bourgeois democracy. A parliamentary coalition of the Social
Democracy with the bourgeois democrats meant for Lenin
marking time and thereby preparing the way for the most
reactionary dictatorship of finance capital. An alliance of the
proletariat and the petty bourgeoisie presupposes the leadership
of a revolutionary party, which can be won only in irreconcilable
struggle with the historical parties of the middle classes.
That is the kernel of Lenin's teaching on the conditions for
preparing the proletarian revolution. It was on these principles,
thoroughly checked and confirmed by the experience of the
October Revolution, that the Communist International was
founded. Our brief theoretical survey should help the reader to
determine correctly the historical position of the latest Commu
nist congress, which, in all the key problems of our epoch, has
liquidated Lenin's teaching, making an abrupt about-face to
opportunism and patriotism.
In accordance with his doctrine of imperialism, Lenin consid
ered it absurd to seek a so-called guilty party in the conflicts of
capitalist states . The diplomacy of each country puts the
responsibility for war on the other side, and the Social Democrats
of each country servilely follow their diplomats in this . Even the
most experienced detectives do not, as is well known, always
catch the firebrand. And what if the powder magazines of Europe
catch fire simultaneously from several sides? The legal criterion
of "culpability" gets us nowhere. The real culprit of wars is
imperialism, that is to say, the irreconcilability of the worldwide
interests brought about by it. The peace of Versailles is just as
much a link in the preparation of the next war as the program of
Hitler, whom this very Versailles treaty helped to victory.
Meanwhile, in a complete break with all the founding charters
of the Communist International, the makers of speeches at the
Seventh Congress, and the participants in the discussions that
followed them, have unanimously repeated that the source of the
war danger is German fascism. The conclusion has been drawn
from this that what is necessary is the firm unity of all
"democratic" and "progressive" forces, all the "friends of peace"
(there is such an expression) for the defense of the Soviet Union,
on the one hand, and Western democracy, on the other. This

superficial, not to s ay , trivial, conception of world relations takes
us right back to the official doctrine of the Entente in 1 9 1 4- 1 8 ;
except that in place of Prussian militarism we n o w have
fascism. 1 22
In actual fact, the cause of the passing of Germany from
shamefaced currying of favor to "equal" aggre ssiveness is not
Hitler's vocal chord s , which do not possess any mystical power,
but the revival of the powerful productive forces of the co untry
after the upheavals of the war and the postwar period. England
and France are defe n ding against Germany not democratic
principles but the artificial balance of power established as a
result of the war. P articipation in the victorious camp of the
defenders of "democracy" did not prevent Italy from being the
first to come to fascism. And to return to the present, it is
precisely Italy, the ally of French democracy-and indirectly of
the Soviet Union too-that is preparing to open the bloody brawl
by its rapacious raid on E thiopia . In the light of these simple and
in contro verti ble facts , the attempt to present the imperialist
antagonisms of Europe a s a clash of the principles of fascism and
democracy is absolutely ridiculous. To this must be added that
the fascist tendencies in France, Czechoslovakia, Rumania, etc . ,
would develop irresistibly i n the event of a war, b u t that the
complete victory of fas cism in Europe would not mitigate one
whit the antagonism s which are tearing it apart.
True enough , in the s peeches of the delegates to the congress
the arguments for the defense of the Central E uropean and
Western democracies from the attacks of National Socialism
invariably took second place to the argument for the defense of
the Soviet state. Ho wever, this hierarchy of arguments can in fact
easily be overthrown and will inevitably be . The duty to defend
"democracy" and " n ational independence" from National Social
ism must evidently preserve its force whether or not the Soviet
Union takes part in the war. As far as the actual defense of the
land of the Soviets i s concerned, this slogan was in fact written
on the banner of the Third International from the first day of its
existence. The Seventh Congress remains form ally under the sign
of this tradition . But what a difference in perspectives and
methods!
Under Lenin , and in the first years after his death, the main
opponents on the world arena were social p atriotism and its
foster brother, democratic pacifism. It was considered unshak
ably established th at they were the ones who were lulling the
minds of the toilers and thereby freeing the hands of imperialism.
Soviet diplomacy, to be sure, had even earlier not shrunk from

taking advantage of the contradictions of imperialism (though
never pretending that they were contradictions between "reac
tion" and "democracy"); but the chief guarantee for the existence
and development of the Soviet Union was seen by the leadership
in the time of Lenin as being the development of the European
and world revolution. It was precisely for this reason that in that
period there could not be talk of any prolonged alliance of the
Soviets with one of the conflicting imperialist groups, nor could
the thought possibly have entered anyone's head that in those
capitalist countries with which the Soviet Union had established
temporary treaty relations the proletariat should replace revolu
tionary struggle against the bourgeoisie by reformist and pacifist
cooperation with the "left" bourgeois parties and with all the
"friends of peace" in general. In the question of war, pacifism,
and "civil war" there has thus been an almost 180-degree turn .
Of course, none of the delegates to the Seventh Congress
directly rej ected proletarian revolution, or the dictatorship of the
proletariat, or all the other terrible things. On the contrary, the
official speechmakers swore that in the depths of their souls they
had not altered at all, and that the change in tactics concerns
only a particular historical stage, when both the Soviet Union
and the remnants of Western democracy have to be defended
from Hitler. It is not, however, advisable to believe these solemn
oath s . If the methods of revolutionary class struggle are useless
in difficult historical conditions, that means that they are
bankrupt in general, especially as the coming epoch is going to be
one of increasing difficulties. How Lenin once scoffed at the
social patriots, who also swore that it was only "for the duration
of the war" that they were consigning to the archives their
international obligations!
At the center of all the debates at the congress stood the most
recent experience in France, in the form of the so-called "People's
Front," which was a bloc of three parties: Communist, Socialist,
and Radical. Direct and indirect cooperation with the Radicals
(the so-called cartel) had always been a component part of the
policy of the Socialist Party. But in contradistinction to the
German Social Democrats, the French section of the Second
International, bound by the revolutionary traditions of its
proletariat, could never make up its mind to take cooperation
with the bourgeois left as far as the setting up of a coalition
government with it. Confining itself to electoral agreements and
common parliamentary votes, the cartel proclaimed as its task
"the defense of democracy" from internal reaction and external

dangers. The French Communist Party, it may be said, grew up
in the struggle against the cartel. When the Socialists, warding
off the blows from the left, adduced in their justification the
necessity for union with the middle classes, the Communists
answered that even though the Radicals were mainly supported
by the petty bourgeoisie, in all questions of importance they
sacrificed its interests to the bankocracy. Alliance with the party
of the Versailles peace, they asserted, was a preparation for a
new war and a new betrayal by the Socialists.
The overthrow of Daladier's ministry by an open uprising of
the armed leagues of reaction (February 6, 1934) brought about
radical changes in the distribution of political forces. Under the
influence of the agitation among the masses the Socialist Party
hastily drew back from the compromised Radicals; it even
expelled from its ranks the faction of the right parliamentarians,
the so-called Neo-Socialists, who considered cooperation with the
bourgeois left to be the principal content of a Socialist policy. On
the other hand, the approach of the fascist danger in France and
the growth of German armaments produced an exactly opposite
evolution in the Comintern, and at a breathtaking pace. The very
same leaders who until February 6 had proclaimed the left
Radical D aladier as nothing but a fascist, and the Socialist leader
Leon Blum as a social fascist, now, under the shock of real
fascism, completely lost faith in themselves and in their banner
and decided-at the direct bidding of Moscow, of course-to seek
salvation in an alliance with the democratic parties, and not only
with the Socialists but also with the Radicals.
The talks, which lasted for several months, had a thoroughly
theatrical character, with a fair admixture of involuntary
comedy. The Socialists did not believe in the sincerity of the
Communists' outpourings of ardent friendship; the "social
fascists" of yesterday were afraid of a plot. And when they
finally realized the strength of the terror of their recent bitter
opponents and agreed to a united front, the second chapter
began: the struggle for an alliance with the Radicals. The
Socialists were obstinate, citing the political fruitlessness
proved by long experience-of a bloc with the party of Herriot
and Daladier, conservatives through and through; but the
insistent pressure of the Communists, the belated neophytes of
the cartel, won the day. The Radicals, from whom their left allies
did not even demand a break with the extreme reaction
represented in the coalition ministry of Laval, reluctantly
accepted the tripartite cartel as a political means of strengthen-
ing their shaky parliamentary positions and ensuring for France

the help of the Red Army as an ultimate reserve. As soon as the
People's Front was established, the Neo-Socialists took up their
natural place in it, beside the party of Briand. 1 23 Their previous
expulsion thus proved to h ave been a simple misunderstanding.
In putting forward the French experience as the model of the
most successful application of the new realistic policy, neither the
speaker, Dimitrov,124 nor the French delegates took the slightest
trouble to analyze what that episodic grouping of forces bearing
the high-flown name of " People's Front" in fact amounted to, in
the social and economic sense. On the contrary, all the orators
stubbornly refused to analyze the program of the new cartel and
its perspectives. This is hardly surprising: the crisis of French
parliamentarianism is above all the crisis of French Radicalism.
The petty-bourgeois masses are increasingly losing faith in the
heroes of the Jacobin phrase, who in fact always turn out to be
one of the instruments of finance capital. J 25 Fascism exploits the
political disillusionment of the petty bourgeoisie of town and
country with the Radical Party. Behind the scenes, finance
capital generously supports the fascist leagues , preparing a new
support for itself. The present regime has a transitional
character. The Radicals are still necessary to support the
unstable national government of Laval.
But the two-faced and thoroughly rotten character of this p arty

is nowhere so deadly clear as in the fact that on the one hand it is
represented by its authoritative leaders in the national govern
ment, which is issuing draconian financial decrees, and on the
other it is part of the People's Front, which is waging a noisy
struggle against the government and its decrees. The Socialists
and the Communists declare that the financial decrees of Laval
are an excellent political gift to fascism; at the same time they
carefully avoid the question of the responsibility of the Radicals
for the government's policy. The whole People's Front is founded
on equivocations, silences, and falsifications. No wonder the
struggle against fascism has assumed a purely decorative
character. The discrediting of the Radicals among the popular
masses has automatically spread to their allies. The "People's
Front, " very noisy but paralyzed by internal contradictions,
shifts from one foot to the other helplessly. At the same time, the
fascists are broadening their political base and perfecting their
military organization. Nobody so much as breathes a word of this
at the congress, where the obligatory monolithism, prescribed in
advance, reigned.
Essentially, the Seventh Congress was called to raise into a law

and to extend to all countries without exception the about-face
carried out by the French Communist Party. The chief paradox of
this congress, by the way, is that, while preaching the necessity
for "a strictly realistic account of the national peculiarities of
each country, " it lays down with a stroke of the pen for all its
sections the "People's Front" as the model to be followed. Since
Dimitrov has acquired a certain moral authority by his courage
ous conduct in the well-known Reichstag fire trial-Dimitrov
never had and does not now have any other right to political
authority-it was he who was assigned the delicate mission of
announcing in a wordy but unsubstantial speech the fact that the
Comintern in the struggle with fascism had entered the road of
democratic coalition and p atriotism. In distinction from the
Socialists, who as we already know could never make up their
minds to a governmental combination with the Radicals, the
Seventh Congress carried through its about-face to the end and
directly posed the problem of the new course as the construction
of a People's Front government.
If, in the immediate future, M arcel Cachin, Thorez, and other
leaders of the French Communist Party do not m anage to form a
common government with the " Radical fascist" Daladier and the
"social fascist" Blum, then the cause at any rate must be sought
in the snares of the historical process and not in the ill will of the
Communist leaders . But if in spite of all the objective indications
(crisis, financial difficulties, revolutionary outbursts in Toulon,
Brest, Ie Havre, etc.),126 the coalition government of the left bloc
nevertheless comes about, it is possible, without being a prophet,
to say in advance that it will be merely a brief episode, and that,
when it itself falls, it will bring down the "People's Front." We
shall be very fortunate if it does not bury in its ruins the
remnants of French democracy.
The first great imperialist war broke out when capitalism

seemed at the peak of its powers , and parliamentarism an eternal
regime. The reformism and p atriotism of the Second Internation
al were supported on this foundation . War? But this is the last
war . . . . Since then all the illusions, both the primary ones and
the derivative ones, have blown away like smoke. The merciless
character of our epoch, which has bared all contradictions to the
root, lends an especially ominous character-and, it may be said,
an especially shabby one-to the capitulation of the Comintern to
those ideas and idols on which at the start of its existence it had
declared a holy war.
The Comintern's Liquidation Congress 93
Nothing now distinguishes the Communists from the Social

Democrats except the traditional phraseology, which is not
difficult to unlearn. Even now the Communist leaders are already
not unsuccessfully picking up drawing-room language in their
dealings with their allies on the right; the old reserve of curses is
preserved only against opponents from the left. It would be no
wonder if the united front is proclaimed the first step towards full
organizational fusion of the parties of the Second and Third
Internationals.
The obstacles in the way of this fusion are rooted not so much
in ideas as in the apparatuses. In England, Belgium, Holland,
and the Scandinavian countries the sections of the Comintern are
too insignificant for the reformist parties to consider themselves
interested in experiments with a united front or in attempts at
fusion. But where the forces are more evenly distributed, above
all in France, the question of fusion is already being posed from
both sides as a practical problem. Will it be decided in the
immediate future? The programmatic and tactical differences of
opinion have been reduced to a minimum since the conclusion of
the Franco-Soviet pact; the Social Democrats promise to defend
the Soviet Union, in exchange for which the Communists promise
to defend the French Republic. In relation to war and national
defense-and this is the basic problem of our epoch-the basis for
unity is thereby present. But there remains the question of the
traditions of the two closed bureaucratic apparatuses and of the
material interests of a considerable number of people who are
bound up with the apparatuses. Whether the united pressure of
fascism and Moscow diplomacy will prove sufficiently strong to
overcome this secondary but very considerable obstacle on the
path of fusion, the future will show. In any case the Seventh
Congress has openly and decisively proclaimed the need to unite
with that very Social Democracy which Stalin a few years ago
was calling the twin of fascism.
If we take the ideological and political development of the
Comintern, leaving aside the question of its fate as an
organization-the body goes on decaying long after the living
soul has departed from it-we can say that the history of the
Third International has found in the Seventh Congress its
ultimate conclusion. Twenty-one years ago Lenin proclaimed the
slogan of a break with reformism and patriotism. Since then, all
the opportunist and intermediate, so-called centrist leaders have
imputed to Lenin above all the guilt of sectarianism . One may
consider Lenin right or wrong, but it cannot be disputed that it
was precisely on the idea of the irreconcilability of the two basic
tendencies in the workers' movement that the Communist

International was founded. The Seventh Congress has arrived at
the conclusion that sectarianism was the source of all the
subsequent great defeats of the proletariat. Stalin is thus
correcting the historical "error" of Lenin, and correcting it
radically: Lenin created the Communist International; Stalin is
abolishing it.
It is, however, already possible to say that even the complete
union of the two Internationals would in no way assure the unity
of the working class. The principles of social patriotism exclude
in advance the possibility of preserving international unity,
especially in an epoch of approaching military clashes. But there
will not prove to be unity even within national limits. At a new
historical stage there will inevitably take place a new irreconcila
ble split in the workers' organizations and a regrouping of their
elements along two axes: opportunist and revolutionary. Even
now, in almost all countries of the world, the banner of the
Fourth International has already been raised. For the moment, of
course, it is merely an affair of small vanguard groups. But
anyone who knows the history of the workers' movement will
understand their symptomatic importance. This side of the
question, however, goes beyond the limits of this article, the aim
of which is to give a general evaluation of the Seventh Congress .
W e repeat again: i t will g o down in history as the liquidation
congress.
TO THE EDITORS OF
ACTION S OCIALI S TE
REVOLUTIONNAIRE127
August 23, 1935
Dear Comrades:
I am an attentive and, you may be sure, friendly reader of
Action Socialiste Reuolutionnaire, and it is in this capacity that I
am sending this letter. You have published your program. This is
a very important document. Its publication represents a maj or
step forward. But despite the absolutely correct general thrust of
your program, the text also contains some imprecise formula
tions, which make you vulnerable to your enemies (and you do
have some), and which can even lead to deviations within your
own tendency. I greatly regret that you did not submit your draft
for a preliminary discussion, not only nationally but also
internationally: not only can socialism not be created in one
country, but neither can revolutionary socialist politics. Com
rades who would have been eager to participate in a preliminary
discussion can now only give their opinions of the published text.
1 . You distinguish between the "conquest of political power"
and the "conquest of economic power." This distinction is
incorrect. It lends itself to dangerous equivocation. The ferocious
ly anti-Marxist anarcho-syndicalists are the ones who invented
the concept of "economic power" in order to sidestep the question
of how to transform society without the conquest of state power.
The reformists willingly use this same formula for their "plans,"
which are supposed to allow (anonymous) "collective" control to
render economic power to the (still anonymous) "collectivity. " Mr.
de Man, this magician of the ambiguous formulation, this
falsifier of scientific socialism, needs the distinction between
political power and economic power. But it is precisely for this
reason that we must reject this terminological trap. "Economic
power," as such, does not exist. There is property, different forms
of property. State power provides the opportunity to retain or, on
the contrary, to abolish capitalist property, depending on whether
95
state power belongs to the bourgeoisie or to the proletariat.

I am sure that we are in fundamental agreement. But you
develop your artificial distinction between two powers in a
dangerous way. On Italy, you say: " It was not the occupation but
the abandonment of the factories which gave rise to fascism . "
You also s a y that the Charleroi miners, i n occupying the mines,
"thus show the way which will result in the expropriation of the
capitalist bourgeoisie." This is not correct. The occupation of
factories and mines is in no way sufficient. If state power
remains in the hands of the bourgeois class, the occupiers will
inevitably be evicted and crushed.
You see that the formulation can be used equally well against
you by the camouflaged, corrupted reformists like de Man and by
both types of syndicalists: anarchists and collaborationists.
In the next to the last p aragraph, which speaks of the
dictatorship of the proletariat, you say: "By the conquest of
power, we mean . . . the seizure of the banks, the factories, the
land, . . . " etc. Why this new, ambiguous p araphrase? By the
conquest of power is meant the conquest of power, that is, the
total takeo ver of the state . But the conquered state must act as an
instrument for the transformation of property, beginning with
the expropri ation of the capitalists. These are two different stages
which can be separated by months and even , in the case of some
types of small capitalists, by years .
Power is power; that is , the most concentrated strength of the
ruling class. Its nature is political (in the most general sense of
th e word), because the state, the instrument of power, is th e
political superstructure par excellence upon the economic founda
tion. But this political power serves not only to regulate
"political" matters, in the narrow, technical sense of the word,
(that is, internal m atters of the state apparatus itself), but also
and above al l economic, cultural , ecclesiastical and other matters.
2 . You propose a "fair redistribution of the land" among the
peasants . What about farm workers? You speak neither of
collective farms, nor of peasant cooperatives aided by the
workers' state. In this way, you fail to advance a socialist
perspective for agriculture.
3 . "Down with big business ! " But we aren't for perpetuating
small business. You do not speak of the state monopoly of foreign
trade, which will have exceptional importance for Belgium. With
the monopoly as a tool , the workers' state could truly help the
productive layers of the petty bourgeoisie and above all guide
them toward socialism.
You fail to mention the abolition of business secrets and
To the Editors of ASR 97
workers' and peasants' control of banks and industry. Yet, every

worker and peasant can well understand that now-when asked
only to sacrifice-they have the right to scrutinize the accounting
"secrets" of the capitalist thieves. This slogan could win
enormous popularity. Charlatans like de Man are always ready to
come up with a whole new "plan," but they're careful not to
mention business secrets, which are the key to exploitation.
4. You vaguely call for the " shorter workweek." Why not the
forty-hour week, an international slogan?
5. On fascism: "These gangs," you say, "benefit from the
support or the protection of the repressive forces that serve the
capitalist bourgeoisie." Why this descriptive formulation? What
"repressive forces?" This refers to the police, the courts, the
headquarters of Vandervelde, de Man, and Spaak. You should
have named these honorable institutions.
6. You propose the creation of "shock troops" to fight fascism.
Why this technical and nonpolitical expression? The rest of us
Marxists speak in this respect of a workers' militia. Why not
solidarize yourselves with this precise slogan, which has become
popular in France and elsewhere?
7. "The struggle against war." This paragraph is best because
it's the most precise. But there is also an important gap. You
speak against national defense. You are right. But you only give
the negative formulation. You should say: We wish neither to
perpetuate nor to defend the "narrow cages" known as national
states . On the contrary, we wish to abolish b orders in order to
create a Socialist United States of Europe, while preparing a
United States of the entire world.
8 . At the end you say, "Down with reformist illusions. "
Unfortunately, you d o n o t explain i n the text what these
reformist illusions consist of or who represents them in Belgium.
This is perhaps the greatest weakness in the program.
There you have, dear comrades, the remarks which I allow
myself in all friendship, and which do not prevent me from
recognizing that your program, despite its imperfections, is
permeated with a proletarian and revolutionary spirit. This spirit
is the sure sign of your victory.
P.8.-1 notice with astonishment that you s ay nothing in your

program about women (salaries, night work, maternity leaves,
etc.). A truly revolutionary tendency which wants to ensure its
future must never neglect questions concerning either young
people or women or oppressed peoples (there is nothing on
colonies in your program!).
At a picnic with their Norwegian hosts, summer 1936.
A CASE FOR A LABOR JURY128
August 29, 1935
On August 9, according to a news item in l 'Humanite, the

Italian Communist Montanari was murdered in the Metro
Belleville [in Paris]. On August 1 2 , l'Humanite printed an
altogether monstrous, but, of course, in no way unusual,
explanation for the murder. The anonymous article appeared
under the title, "Laval and the Fascists Swell the Provocations."
This headline, which is part of the official campaign against the
Laval ministry and the fascists, was accompanied by a subhead,
"Montanari Murdered by a Trotskyist Provocateur."
Fundamentally, the j uxtaposition of these two headlines is
quite characteristic of the article, the author, and the newspaper
itself. But the text contains not only vile assertions but
innumerable downright contradictory ones.
"The murderer is Guido Beiso, the well-known Italian Trotsky
ist who has been carrying on provocateur activities for a long
time among the Italian emigres." What is implied by "provoca
teur activities" in this connection? Has he been making speeches
against social patriotism or is he in the employ of Mussolini? We
are kept uninformed on this score. Further on we are told that
Montanari "had become the target for the hatred of the
Trotskyist elements who had been expelled from the party, and
who s ubsequently" (that is, after their expulsion) "resorted to
open and criminal provocateur activities."
The case becomes more and more involved. It seems that not
only Guido Beiso, but an entire group of expelled Italian
"Trotskyists" was engaged in "open (!) provocation." In the
service of the fascist police? Again no direct statement. But in
order not to leave the reader in doubt as to the meaning of the
word "provocation , " the article adds that Beiso has been living
"like a lord." Finally we discover that in Nice, Beiso had been
"exposed as a provocateur (by whom?) who was bound up (??)
with the entire fascist work of penetrating the antifascist
masses ."
99
This confused statement already contains a direct charge of a

connection with the fas cists. Let us bear this in mind.
From Nice, Beiso arrived in Paris and murdered Montanari. It
is well known that the fascists murder Communists and
particularly revolutionists. It is quite in the nature of things for a
fascist provocateur to pose as a "Socialist" or a "Communist" or
a "Trotskyist." But we have been told beforehand that the
murderer was a "well-known Italian Trotskyist." Does this mean
to say that he turned from a Trotskyist to a fascist, i.e., changed
his revolutionary position? Such cases are not unknown. But
l'Humanite does not raise this question. In harmony with the two
headlines, it proceeds to develop the dual version: simultaneously
both a "Trotskyist" and a fascist. This amalgam is the pivot for
the entire indictment.
Further down we read, not without surprise, "His explanation
that he wanted to avenge himself for unjust charges is only a
screen intended to hide the truth. " We are not clearly and
expressly informed as to what this "truth" is. Instead we shortly
and incidentally discover that the murderer had felt himself to be
maliciously slandered, had protested, and in revenge had used
the revolver. At any rate that is the murderer's own version. Let
us keep this in mind as well.
The anonymous article proceeds to state further that the Italian
CP had long since issued a warning to be on guard against the
"dubious actions of this individual." Why dubious? Only
dubious? Hadn't we just been told that Beiso was "exposed" as a
fascist provocateur in Nice? Exposed! The work of a provocateur
has never yet been assumed to be dubious. A provocateur is a
mercenary scoundrel, nothing more. If one maintains that
another's activities are dubious, then it means that one has only
suspicions but no proof. In such cases, genuine revolutionary
organizations gather the necessary evidence before proceeding
with open indictments. That has been the revolutionary tradition
from time immemorial. And yet from the words of l'Humanite
itself we have to draw the conclusion that Beiso was not exposed
as a provocateur, but only suspected of being one (by whom? for
what? when?), and that besides he himself angrily objected to
these charges . And on top of this we are also told that "Beiso
decided to come to Paris, where he did not conceal his murderous
intentions. " At this point we become entirely perplexed. Had
Beiso really been in the employ of the fascists, had he "lived like
a lord, " had he really been exposed as a provocateur and arrived
in Paris in order to p erpetrate a fascist murder, how could he
have failed to hide his murderous intentions? Here the version
A Case for a L abor J ury 101
provided by l'Humanite contains a fresh and patent absurdity.

The author is unable to present his own version consistently.
As the anonymous article proceeds, it becomes more and more
entangled. We read that "the provocateur was n ever a member of
the CP" (yet we had just been told that he belonged to a group of
expelled "Trotskyists"), "this agent of fascism among the Italian
emigres naturally found sympathy and shelter among the
Trotskyist groups . . . . " And in this manner we get a new
version: he was not a "well-known Italian Trotskyist, " as was
originally stated, who became a fascist provocateur after his
expulsion from the party; no! he was a fascist provocateur, never
a member of the party, who "naturally" (of course! of course!)
found sympathy among the Trotskyists. And to leave no further
doubt as to the source of the information or its purpose, the
anonymous author appends to this the following: "It was almost
(!) in the same way that our comrade Kirov was murdered. " 1 2 9
Almost! But Kirov was indeed murdered by a party member, as
was established by the official documents, and no one had placed
the blame on fascist provocation.
Mter several more new zigzags, the article concludes with an
utterly amazing political moral: "The French workers, made m ore
cautious and wiser by the lessons of Austria and Spain, will not
be led into this criminal trap. " A remarkable revelation! The
defensive uprisings of Austria and Spain, which even the social
patriotic and pro coalition congress of the C ommunist Interna
tional was compelled to recognize as heroic actions on the part of
the proletariat-these, in the judgment of l'Humanite, were in
reality the product of the activities of fascist provocateurs, the
very same ones who killed Kirov in Leningrad and Montanari in
Paris. This abysmally profound moral of the Marxists from
l'H umanite is obviously especially intended for the workers of
Toulon and Brest.
The reader will agree with us if we say that this article
resembles a page from the diary of a lunatic. Only there is
method in this madness, and it has not yet said its last word. So
let us pursue the further developments of this case.
The Italian Bolshevik-Leninists, against whom the anonymous
author leveled his anonymous charges, declared on August 1 4 ,
through Comrade Jean Rous, a leading member of the French
Socialist Party, that "Beiso was never a member of our
organization, nor did we have any sort of relations with him, and
we never even heard his name before."13 o Isn't that clear enough?
On August 15, l'H umanite, which had flung a political denuncia
tion full of lies, finds itself compelled to state: "We are taking
under consideration the declaration of the Italian Trotskyist

group." But l'Humanite would have remained true neither to
itself nor to its lord and master had it simply bit its tongue and
kept quiet. No. This rag immediately adds that it has in its
possession certain letters of the murderer which clearly indicate
that Beiso "was imbued with the counterrevolutionary Trotskyist
ideology." On the heels of all they had said previously, this rings
a trifle overstrained. "Ideology"! We are well aware what can be
done with this subtle substance in the chemical laboratory of
Messrs. Duclos and Company.
Mter several new and this time entirely amorphous and elusive
insinuations, in which impotence is mixed with malice, l'Human
ite concludes: "Naturally, the tie-up between the murderer and the
Trotskyists (who have just categorically denied it-L.T.) does not
exclude an understanding between Beiso and the fascist provoca
teurs. It all ties together." "Naturally"! But why do these bold
cowards now say that "it does not exclude" ? Is it only a question
of something not being excluded? On August 12 they did indeed
proclaim that Beiso, this "well-known Trotskyist," had been
exposed as a fascist provocateur, who "lived like a lord,"
obviously on Mussolini's gold. Now it appears only that the l arge
and sharp ears of l'Humanite are able to distinguish notes of a
Trotskyist ideology (ideology!) in the letters of the murderer,
which circumstance "does not exclude" (that is all: does not
exclude) a tie-up between Beiso and the fascists. "It all ties
together" . . . with stitches of white thread.
Finally, on August 18, l'Humanite published a proclamation of
the Central Committee of the Italian CP: Montanari was the
victim of "a murder, for which counterrevolutionary mission the
agents of the fascist reaction had prepared themselves in the
circles of the Trotskyist and Bordigist emigre groupS. " 1 3 1 No
more, no less! This information is all the more interesting because
in it the Bordigists appear on the scene for the first time, a group
which is neither ideologically nor organizationally connected
with the so-called "Trotskyists , " but which-and we have not the
slightest doubt about it-had as little to do with the murder as the
Bolshevik-Leninists. The Bordigists are dragged in only so as to
widen the radius of the slander: the Italian Stalinists have to
reap a little additional profit on their own account. But what is
most remarkable about the communication of the Italian CP is
that it does not at all mention in any way Beiso's connection with
the fascists. No, the matter is much more involved, or, if you will,
much simpler: the Trotskyists and the Bordigists are "in general"
A Case for a Labor J ury 103
the agents of fascist reaction and Beiso prepared himself for his
mission in these "circles," i.e., within both these circles, which
are fighting one another. Now, at last, we can grasp the meaning
of the words, "It was almost in the same way that our comrade
Kirov was murdered." That is to say: it was almost in the same
way that scores of people were indicted in the Kirov assassina
tion who were in no way implicated in the murder.
Out of this entire snarl of interlinking slanders and insinua

tions that crumble into dust, one thing stands out each time,
namely, that Guido Beiso came into some sort of sharp conflict
with the organization of the Italian CP, or some of its members.
If one were to leave aside the all-embracing and therefore in no
way illuminating "ideology," then any normal thinking individu
al would ask the question: What was it that really drove Beiso to
commit murder? If we do not proceed from the assumption that
he was mentally unbalanced (there is no evidence for this as yet),
we can only arrive at the conclusion that he must have been
subjected to an ex traordinarily painful personal experience,
which he found insuffera ble, which finally threw him off balance
and drove him to a senseless and criminal act. But who drove
him through this insufferable experience? Was it the "Trotskyist"
organization with whom Beiso had had no relation whatsoever,
or was it the organization in whose name l'H umanite speaks?
Thus, and only thus, does the question stand. Doesn't it follow
from this that the Italian Stalinists accuse Beiso, whom they
despise, of provocation, without any real evidence, perhaps
without any evidence at all, i.e., they utilize those poisonous
weapons which serve these people as political arguments for the
most part? As is evident from l'H umanite itself, Beiso himself
had protested most violently against the accusations, and
threatened the authors with death. No provocateur who had
undertaken the murder of a revolutionist would act that way; but
an unknown and a hotheaded emigre could act in this manner,
finding no other means of defense against the slander campaign.
By these hypothetical considerations (and it is only a question of
hypothesis) we do not mean to cast the slightest shadow on the
murdered Montanari. It is entirely possible that he fell an
accidental victim, or-if he did participate in hounding the
alleged "provocateur"-he did so in good faith because he trusted
his party and its thoroughly demoralized leadership. But
Montanari's personality does not solve the question of Beiso's
motives.
Scoundrels will say that we advocate or justify murder as a

method for solving conflicts within revolutionary circles. But we
are not writing for scoundrels. The Montanari-Beiso case is
important precisely because a conflict on the political plane has
led to a supremely senseless act of murder of one emigre by
another. In this lies an ominously serious warning, and it is
necessary to grasp its significance in time!
The matter is now in the hands of the bourgeois law courts. The
official investigation is obviously not intended to cast light on the
bloody tragedy from the standpoint of revolutionary proletarian
morals. The prosecution will probably try only to compromise the
proletarian emigres and the revolutionary organizations in
particular. But the agents of the Comintern will also try to exploit
the trial for every vile purpose, as they are obliged to do. The duty
of workers' organizations, regardless of their political banners,
lies in one thing: in shedding the greatest light possible on this
case, and thereby, insofar as it is possible, preventing the
repetition of gunplay in revolutionary circles.
In our opinion the labor organizations must establish, without
any further delay, an authoritative and nonpartisan committee
which would go over all the material, including Beiso's letters
mentioned in ['H umanite, and examine all the witnesses and
representatives of the parties and groups who are concerned or
interested in the case, so that the political, moral, and personal
circumstances in the case may be clearly established. This is
necessary not only in memory of Montanari, not only to reveal
Beiso's real motives, but also to purge the atmosphere of all
working class organizations of treachery, slander, harassment,
and gunplay. Naturally, the interests of the case would be best
served if representatives of l'H umanite and of the Central
Committee of the Italian CP were to take part in this committee.
But we may safely predict that they will most certainly refuse:
these politicians stand only to lose from an impartial investiga
tion, and much more than would appear on the surface. But the
investigation ought not to be wrecked by their refusal to
participate. Every honest participant in the labor movement is
deeply interested in seeing to it that this abcess is opened, which
can otherwise develop into gangrene. The tragic case of
Montanari-Beiso must be brought before a labor jury.
AN APPEAL132
Published September 1935
In the last two years our Biulleten has appeared less frequently
than in previous years. The reasons were many, not the least
being what are called "circumstances beyond our control." We
hope that in the future we will manage to bring out the Biulleten
more regularly and more frequently.
The need for our publication to come out on a more normal
basis is absolutely clear. The question of the Soviet Union, linked
as it is with the growing danger of war, now assumes exceptional
significance for the world workers' movement. At the same time
the internal contradictions of the workers' state have reached an
unprecedented sharpness. On the one hand we hear from
reporters at the Seventh Congress of the Comintern that "the
classless society" has already been built, that socialism has been
completely and definitively established, etc. On the other hand
the Soviet newspapers are full of news about hooliganism among
the youth, barbarous family customs, desertion and neglect of
children. Near the end of the second five year plan the
government passed and put into effect a law allowing juvenile
criminals to be shot. At the slightest show of critical thought the
uncontrolled bureaucracy of the "socialist society" (!) replies with
rabid terrorism. At the same time we note the fact, paradoxical at
first sight but in reality profoundly natural, that the reformists
and bourgeois democrats, who had a hostile attitude toward
Soviet power in the first heroic years of its existence, now seek
friendship with the Moscow bureaucracy, willingly declare
themselves to be "friends of the Soviet Union," and maintain a
conspiracy of silence about the crimes of the Stalinist clique.
In these pages we propose to examine in Marxist terms the
internal development of the Soviet Union, its conquests as well as
its contradictions. The regroupment in the world workers'
movement has begun and it will go on at an accelerated pace. The
last Moscow congress will give it a new impulse. The Russian
105
Bolshevik-Leninists must once and for all shake from their boots
the dust of the so-called "Communist International." The
Biulleten is the unofficial organ, but no less the genuine one, of
the Russian section of the Fourth International, which is being
built. We propose to examine in the pages of our journal the
fundamental questions of the world workers' movement. In
addition, we reserve to ourselves the right to that principled
intransigence which constitutes the finest tradition of Marxism.
In every country, without exception, the organizations of the
Fourth International have powerful enemies, beginning on the
right flank with imperialist reaction (let us recall the campaign,
monstrous in its malignancy, of Hitler and the French bourgeois
press in connection with the "discovery" of L.D. Trotsky at
Barbizon), passing through the reformists (let us recall the recent
expulsion of the leading group of the Bolshevik-Leninists from
the organization of the French Socialist Youth),133 ending up with
the Stalinists, with their amalgams, trials, and shootings.
Moreover, first place in this concert of hatred goes unquestion
ably to the Stalinists.
Our friends at present are incomparably less numerous than
our enemies. But we know how to be in the minority. We have
confidence in the strength of our ideas. History has already
shown in one case how a small minority, armed with a correct
program, at the decisive moment came to the head of the entire
people. The ebbing historic wave has thrown the revolutionary
vanguard back. There is nothing to be done about it! We do not
complain about history's whims; we take it as it is. We rely on its
inner forces and begin the new ascent.
Everywhere, our friends are in the minority. But they are
genuine friends, tempered and tested. Their number grows
steadily in every country of the world. The logic of events
educates them and strengthens their resolve.
We firmly hope that our friends will help the Biulleten to carry
out its task.
Collect subscribers for us! Organize the sale of single copies!
Collect money! Use every trip to the Soviet Union for taking in
the Biulleten, collecting information, and establishing connec
tions. A great part of this work can be done successfully not only
by the Russian comrades but by the foreign comrades as well.
HOW HISTORY AND BIOGRAPHY
ARE WRITTEN134
Published September 1 935
A considerable portion of Pravda for August 5 is devoted to the

fortieth anniversary of the death of Engels. 135 Poor Engels!
Surely he is undeserving of this mockery. Engels was not only a
man of genius but also the soul of conscientiousness. In literary
work as well as in practical affairs he could not bear sloppiness,
inaccuracy, and inexactitude. He checked every comma (in the
literal sense of the term) of Marx's posthumous work, and carried
on a correspondence on the subject of secondary orthographic
errors. Then why does the central organ of the Moscow bureau
cracy come down upon the great thinker and writer with
this flood of articles in which side by side with the tendentious
and, so to speak, standard lies one meets at every step with the lie
that is unpremeditated, born of ignorance, heedlessness, and
irresponsibility?
The leading article reads: "The reverberations of the shots on
the barricades of the bourgeois revolutions had hardly subsided
. . . when Marx and Engels were already pointing to the majestic
figure of the proletariat, this gravedigger . . . " and so forth and
so on. What sort of "bourgeois revolutions" are made mention of
here? During the barricades in the year 1 830, Marx and Engels
were still children and incapable of pointing out the "majestic
figure of the proletariat." Consequently the statement must relate
only to the revolutions of 1 848. But The Condition of the Working
Class in Engl and, the work of genius by the young Engels,
appeared as early as 1 845. Finally, Marx and Engels did not at
all await the reverberation of 1 848 to proclaim to the world the
doctrine of scientific socialism. The Communist Manifesto and-
let the editors of Pravda be apprised of this-appeared not after

the "last shots had sounded" but prior to the time the first bullets
hummed in the revolutions of 1848.136
But what does a functionary fulfilling the duties of a publicist
107
care about the chronology of revolutions, or the ideological

development of Marx and Engels to boot? Not for nothing did
Bismarck say, "Give me a journalist and I'll make a good
functionary out of him; but there is no making a good journalist
even out of a dozen functionaries."137
Quoting from the obituary in the Neue Zeit ( 1895) the sentence
to the effect that with the death of Engels "Marx finally died
too," the leading article unexpectedly appends the following: "the
leaders of the Social Democracy who had slid down into the
swamp of reformism and opportunism made haste to inter
together with the remains of Engels the revolutionary teachings
of Marxism." This is indeed sharpshooting: aim a finger at the
sky and hit the bull's eye! Revisionism appeared only in 1897; the
name itself came still later; the weekly Neue Zeit was the organ
not of revisionism but of the struggle against revisionism. The
above-quoted sentence did not at all imply that revolutionary
Marxism was being buried together with Engels. To ascribe such
a notion to the Neue Zeit of 1895 is tantamount to being an utter
ignoramus about the history of Marxism. In reality, the thought
expressed in the Neue Zeit was to the effect that with Engels's
death there also died that part of Marx's living personality which
had continued to exist in Engels. In these words is beautifully
expressed the well-nigh indivisible creative collaboration of Marx
and Engels. But the functionary fulfilling the duties of a publicist
is of the opinion that he best expresses his belated hostility to
revisionism when he provides a stupid and pettifogging interpre
tation of a clever and correct thought. And this at the moment
when the entire policy of the Communist International is being
directed into channels of reformism!
The Marx-Engels-Lenin Institute publishes in the same issue a
letter from Engels to Kautsky which subjects to criticism the
Lassallean formula of "the single reactionary mass of the ruling
classes."138 The aim of publishing it is quite clear: the institute for
the falsification of Marxism and Leninism seeks by means of this
quotation to provide a prop for the policy of coalition with the
"democratic" bourgeoisie. It is unnecessary to dwell here on the
political fraud: toil and moil as Messrs. Functionaries may, they
will not succeed in transforming Engels into the theoretician of
conciliationism with the bourgeoisie. But at any rate, these
gentlemen have forgotten to explain to us how the negation of the
"single reactionary mass of the ruling classes" is reconcilable
with the immortal aphorism of Stalin on the subject of-fascism
and Social Democracy. But here is the remarkable part:
How History and Biography Are Written 109
publishing the letter in its own solemn name, the Institute in a

brief introduction commits, in the course of eight lines, two, if not
three, gross mistakes.
Says the learned Institute: "In this letter, Engels subjects to
criticism the draft of the Erfurt program in which Kautsky,
despite the instructions of Marx and Engels, was smuggling in
the Lassallean thesis of the single reactionary mass."139
There could have been no instructions from Marx to Kautsky
for the reason that Marx had died some eight years prior to the
drafting of the Erfurt program; the only letter that Marx did write
to Kautsky (in 1881) says absolutely nothing concerning the
question that interests us. As regards Engels, in his letter to
Kautsky he actually did subject to merciless criticism the phrase
on the "single reactionary mass. " But he did not at all ascribe it
to Kautsky; he knew that this phrase was inserted by someone
(obviously Wilhelm Liebknecht)14o into Kautsky's original draft,
which had been approved in essence by E ngels. Engels's critical
letter was intended to supply Kautsky with support against
Liebknecht, and especially against the old Lassalleans . "Ordi
nary" mortals have the privilege of not knowing this. But the
learned Marx-Engels-Lenin Institute?! . . .
Further on we read: "The instructions of Engels to the leaders
of the German Social Democracy were not executed when the
final text of the program was accepted" (our emphasis). The style
itself is noteworthy: the "instructions" of the head of the
department were not "executed" by an underling. But E ngels was
not the one and indivisible "leader." He issued "instructions" to
nobody. He was merely a thinker of genius and he gave
theoretical and political advice to different parties. Nobody was
duty-bound to "execute. " This sentence, so remarkable stylistical
ly, is all the worse for being false in essence. The formula of the
"single mass" was deleted from the text of the Erfurt program,
and Engels in his correspondence expressed his complete
satisfaction on this score. What a lot of lying in eight lines for a
learned institution!
In the third article devoted to Engels's attitude to the Russian
revolution we are informed that in a letter to the Emancipation of
Labor Group,l4l Engels warned against a mechanistic and
doctrinaire understanding of Marxism. And the sage Pravda
remarks in this connection: "Alas! The outstanding members of
the group gleaned little benefit (!) from this warning of E ngels;
two decades later they turned up in the camp of the Menshe
viks . . . . " But what happened in the course of these two
decades? Plekhanov's splendid and victorious struggle against

philosophical idealism, against historic subjectivism and the
economic superstition of the Narodniks;142 the entire work of the
Emancipation of Labor Group, unprecedented in courage and
staunchness-the work directly upon which was nurtured the
oldest generation of the Russian Marxists, including Lenin
himself-all this is a "trifle " to the ignorant and bombastic
Pravda. But Lenin, indeed, was enthralled by Plekhanov, he was,
to use his own expression, "in love" with Plekhanov, nor did he
forget the latter's great Marxist services even during the periods
of irreconcilable struggle with him. Why, even Engels himself,
after the letter to Zasulich in 1883,143 had the opportunity over a
period of some twelve years to observe directly the activity of the
Emancipation of Labor Group, and he referred with extreme
praise to the work of Plekhanov. Generally speaking, the old man
was quite chary of praise. But the functionary who has been able
to understand neither Engels nor Lenin nor Plekhanov sets upon
the activity of the Emancipation of Labor Group the seal of his
s evere verdict: "little benefit." One is impelled to say that only
harm can come from such bureaucratic insects in literature.
One could cull another dozen similar pearls , for each author
contributed his bit to the public tree,sure chest of ignorance. But
the reader must be fed up to his neck already. We shall only add a
few words on the score of bureaucratic pathos. The leading article
speaks of "the chapters of Capital and Anti-Duehring flaming
with revolutionary passion and hatred of the exploiters, and icy
in their wondrous philosophic profundity . . . . " It is impossible to
write more choicely. A philosophic profundity which turns into
an iceberg at the same time that the flames of h atred flare. It is
clear that at the mere sight of Capital the editors of Pravda get
fever and chills. Further on, mention is made of the "immortal
and destructive (?) lines on the Gotha program" and of the
"flame-belching pamphlet" on the Paris Commune.l44 In short,
the flame-belching functionaries-in-waiting write in a wondrous
manner: the reader breaks out in a rash of burns and blisters.
But the first prize indubitably goes to D. Zaslavsky.l45 In the
literary sense he is immeasurably more literate than the rest, and
in regards to flame-belching p athos he can give anybody cards
and spades. Zaslavsky concludes his article with the following
words: "It was not by accident that the remarkable and well
worth-studying friendship between Marx and Engels found its
counterpart in the remarkable kinship, the great friendship
between Lenin and Stalin." An immortal Russian satirist has
How His tory and Biography A re Written 111
made a remark bearing upon such a case. Said he: "After this, the
son of a gun squats on his haunches and waits to be petted."
Marx and Engels were bound together by forty years of titanic
mental labor. The most informed and penetrating students of
Marxism, like Ryazanov, 146 have been unable-for it is unthink
able in general-to conclusively establish the line of demarcation
between their creative work. As regards Lenin and . . . Stalin, we
want to be shown not a line of demarcation, but a line of
contiguity. In the titanic mental labor of Lenin, Stalin occupied
the post of an ordinary "activist" side by side with a score of
others . As regards "friendship" it is enough to recall Lenin's
testament and his letter written on his deathbed,147 in which he
broke off all personal and comradely relations with Stalin. But
why pick on . . D. Zaslavsky? He is the same scribbler who in
.
1917 hounded Lenin in the bourgeois chauvinist press as the paid

agent of the German Kaiser. In a whole series of articles Lenin
never made reference to Zaslavsky otherwise than as a "scoun
drel." Only after the NEP and after the first pogrom against the
Left Opposition was this individual able to enter the employ of
the Soviet bureaucracy. At any rate, he remains true to himself in
one thing: he slandered Lenin while Lenin was alive and he
continues to slander him after he is dead. Such gentlemen are
capable of proposing, say, for the eighteenth anniversary of
October, to rename a dozen volumes of Lenin as the Collected
Works of Stalin, in accordance witn the same method by which a
city like Tsaritsin is renamed Stalin grad: a single decree-and
the matter is in the bag.
But let the lackeys sweat as they will, they will not attain their
goal: we will stand in defense of Marx and Engels and Lenin
against all the institutes and all the Zaslavskys.
LETTER TO THE EMIGRE COMMITTEE
OF THE IKD148
September 2, 1 935
Dear Comrades:
1 . I read the German circular letters which I received from -
with the greatest interest. First of all they give an informative
picture of the internal situation. Second, they prove that we have
cadres in Germany whose Marxist capabilities we can really be
proud of. What the report from J- says about the situation in the
factories is very important, and it further encourages me in the
analysis I put forward in the comments on the theses of the
Emigre Committee.
The second report (on the German situation) is highly
revealing, also, with respect to the church question, over which
there has been far too much debate. Possibly some German
comrades still have too purely propagandistic an orientation.
This is connected with the attitude taken by U nser Wort.149 The
paper has to be strengthened. It has a base in Germany and with
the intervention of our cadres we can expand it successfully.
However, the prerequisite is that Unser Wort appear regularly, at
least twice a month, and at least once a month with six pages.
This would provide the opportunity to give two pages to more
current, agitational themes, without disregarding theoretical
questions and international information. Every issue should
have, I repeat, some columns filled with little notes (five to ten
lines) about the internal affairs of the workers' organizations.
The German comrades are highly interested in these questions,
as the reports show.
2. I hear that some comrades think or perhaps thought that the
turn on the SAP question, externally connected with the article
about alchemy, came about in a way that was not completely
democratic. This question seems to me of such importance for an
understanding of democratic centralism that I would like to say a
few words about it here. The last convention of the IKD
112
Letter to the Emigre Committee of the IKD 113
unquestionably adopted the line o f approaching the SAP. At that

time the representatives of the Emigre Committee considered this
perspective hopeless. But they rightly thought it necessary to give
the German section the opportunity to go through its own
experience in this field, for it was really much easier to come to
an appropriate conclusion abroad (where the leadership was close
at hand) than in Germany. But the sense of the resolution passed
by the convention was not that it should be valid forever. It was a
question of making a practical attempt and proceeding further on
the basis of the results obtained. The attitude of the SAP
leadership abroad, as well as the reports from Germany itself,
showed without any doubt that there was nothing more to be
gained by negotiating with the SAP and that these negotiations
only serve to paralyze our own organization. This was what the
Emigre Committee thought. It was in agreement with the
conclusions I drew from our international experience. In the
discussion with Comrade Braun the agreement on this question
proved to be unanimous.
What should the leadership do in this situation? Several
comrades thought that the leadership should initiate a new
discussion and on that basis hold a new convention or a
referendum. This would be real "democracy." Perhaps. But of
revolutionary centralism, initiative, readiness to act, and sense of
responsibility, there would not be the slightest trace. If you
proceed in such a way that in every question the responsibility is
left up to the membership, there is no point in having a
leadership. An adding machine would do. Especially given the
German conditions, the idea of pure party democracy (minus
Bolshevik centralism) is clearly utopian. The leadership must
also have the courage to declare that an action decided on by the
next highest body, the convention, is outlived, and draw the
necessary conclusions from this. Of course, in doing so the
leadership must be sure that it is expressing the genuine
experience of the majority of the organization. And the Emigre
Committee and the author of the article were firmly convinced of
this.
Was this assessment confirmed? Completely. First by the fact
that after brief consideration the comrades in Germany concurred
with this necessary turn. Second, by the SAP's latest heroics in
the international arena. I repeat, a leadership which in a critical
moment cannot summon up the courage to carry out a turn
within twenty-four hours, on its own initiative, without losing
time, and while still reflecting the experience of the whole
organization, is not worth calling a leadership. Of course, in

doing so they run the risk of committing a blunder, of being
chastised by the organization, or even of being removed. Every
profession has its hazards, and this in particular is the hazard of
the leadership profession.
With Communist greetings,
L. Trotsky
THE TERROR OF BUREAUCRATIC
SELF -PRESERV ATION 150
September 6, 1 935
We have a remarkable document in the letter of Comrade

Tarov, one of the Soviet Bolshevik-Leninists, a mechanic who of
necessity finds himself today outside the Soviet Union.151 E arly
in 1928, Tarov was arrested as a "Left Oppositionist"; he spent
three years in exile, and four years in prison, in harsh solitary
confinement, and then, once again, several months in exile.
What crimes did Tarov commit against the revolution? It
appears that as early as 1923 he was of the opinion that the
October Revolution had created the opportunities for immeasura
bly more rapid industrialization than was the case with capitalist
countries. Together with other Tarovs he raised the alarm
against the policy of staking everything upon the kulak, which
would lead to a crisis for the entire Soviet system. He demanded
that efforts be focused upon the peasant poor and the systematic
switching of the rural economy onto the rails of collectivization.
Such were his chief crimes for the period of 1923-26. He was more
penetrating and farsighted than the ruling upper crust. In any
case, such were the crimes of the tendency for which Tarov bore
the responsibility.
In 1926, all the Tarovs demanded that the Soviet trade unions
bring to an end the political friendship with the General Council
of British Trades Unions , which was betraying the miners' strike,
together with the general strike: it was precisely for this service
that Citrine, the head of the General Council, the former ally of
Stalin and Tomsky, was knighted by His Royal Maj esty during
the Jubilee celebrations.152 Together with other Leninists, Tarov
protested in 1926 against the Stalinist theory of a "democratic
workers' and peasants' state"-a theory which impelled the
Polish Communist Party to support Pilsudski's coup. But even
this does not exhaust the list of Tarov's crimes. As an
internationalist, he was vitally interested in the fate of the
115
Chinese Revolution. He considered those Kremlin decisions

criminal which compelled the young and heroic Communist
Party of China to enter into the Kuomintang and to submit to its
discipline; 153 in addition to which, the Kuomintang itself, a purely
bourgeois party, was accepted into the Communist International
as a "sympathetic" organization. The time came when Stalin,
Molotov, and Bukharin sent a telegram from Moscow, calling
upon Chinese Communists to put down the agrarian movement
of the peasants, so as not to " scare away" Chiang Kai-shek and
his officers.154 Tarov, together with other disciples of Lenin,
cons idered such a policy to be a betrayal of the revolution.
The Tarovs had several other similar crimes to their credit.
From 1923 on, they demanded that work proceed on the drafting
of the five year plan;155 and when, in 1927, the draft of the first
five year plan was finally outlined, all the Tarovs argued that the
annual increase in industry should be set not at 5-9 percent, as
was done by the Political Bureau, but at two or three times that.
True, this was all soon confirmed. But since the Tarovs, by virtue
of their foresight, had exposed the backwardness of the ruling
upper crust, they were therefore guilty of undermining the
revolution (i.e., the prestige of the bureaucracy).
The Tarovs paid a great deal of attention to the working class
youth. In their opinion, the youth had to be given an opportunity
to do some independent thinking, to study, make mistakes, and
learn to stand on their own feet. They protested against the fact
that revolutionary leadership had been replaced by a regime of
bulldozing corporals. They forecasted that this barracks-room
strangulation of the youth must lead to demoralization and to the
growth of outright hooligan and reactionary moods in its midst.
These warnings were branded as an attempt to set the young
generation against the old, as a mutiny against the "Old
Guard" -the very same "Old Guard" which has been slandered,
smashed, and committed to j ails, or demoralized by Stalin with
the aid of his praetorians.
Such are Tarov's crimes. To this we must add that the
Bolshevik-Leninists, including Tarov, never attempted to impose
their ideas by force. They did not call for an uprising against the
bureaucracy. For a period of almost ten years they sought and
hoped to convince the party. They fought primarily for their right
to bring their criticism and their proposals before the party. But
the bureaucracy, which had raised itself to autocratic rule upon
the defeats of the world proletariat, counterposed to the Leninist
Opposition not the force of argument, but the armed detachments
of the GPD. 156 Tarov happened to be among several thousands
The Terror of B ureaucrati c Self-Preservati o n 117
who were arrested during the Thermidorean annihilation of the

Opposition in 1928.157 Thereafter he spent more than three years
in exile, and about four years in jail. From his present brief story
the reader is able to acquaint himself with the conditions that
prevail in these j ails: abuse, corporal punishment, the fourteen
day torture of a hunger strike, and, in answer to it, forced feeding
and new abuse. All this because the Bolshevik-Leninists posed
the problem of collectivization before Stalin did, because they
issued a timely warning against the consequences of the
perfidious alliance with Chiang Kai-shek and the future Sir
Walter Citrine . . . .
But then came a new thunderclap from the blue: Hitler came to
power in Germany. The policy of the Communist International
had cleared the road for him. When Hitler was hoisting himself
into the saddle, his stirrup was held by none other than Stalin.
All the floods of eloquence poured forth by the Seventh Congress
will not wash away from the ennobled leaders the blots of this
historic crime. All the more rabid became the hatred of the
Stalinist clique for all thos e who had foreseen and forewarned in
time. The captive Leninists had to pay with their ribs for the
deadly policy which combined ignorance with perfidy: it is
precisely this combination that provides the essence of Stalinism.
Yet Tarov, alarmed by the triumph of National Socialism,
turned to the authorities in Moscow with the following proposal:
he pledges to give up Oppositionist activity, in return for which
he, Tarov, is to be given the right to return to the ranks of the
party, as a disciplined soldier, and there carry on the struggle
against the fascist danger.
It is not difficult to explain the psychological causes for Tarov's
step. There is no position m ore torturous for a revolutionist than
to be bound hand and foot while the imperialist reaction is
capturing one proletarian trench after another. But Tarov's
political proposal was doubly unrealistic. In the first place, to
support Stalin's struggle against fascism uncri ti cally is, in the
last analysis, to help fascism-this has been irrefutably proved
by the entire history of the last twelve years; in the second place,
Tarov's proposal was not acceptable, and could not have been
accepted by the bureaucracy. Even a single Leninist unselfishly
and courageously fulfilling the tasks assigned him, in full view,
without recanting publicly and without spitting upon the best
traditions of Bolshevism, would be a silent refutation of the
legend entitled "Trotskyism as the vanguard of the bourgeois
counterrevolution." This asinine legend wobbles on its mythical
underpinnings, and has to be propped up daily. Furthermore,
Tarov's example, if he were successful, would inevitably arouse

emulation. This could not be allowed. It is impermissible to allow
bold men, who surrender only the public expression of their
views, to return to the party-no, they must renounce their ideas,
their right to think altogether. They must spit upon views which
have been confirmed by the entire course of events.
Nothing so characterizes the Stalinist regime, its internal
corruption and fraud, as its utter inability to assimilate a sincere
revolutionist who is ready to serve obediently, but refuses to lie.
No! Stalin needs apostates, bellowing renegades, people who are
shamelessly ready to call black white, who beat their hollow
breasts pathetically, while their minds are actually occupied with
pie-cards, automobiles, and summer resorts. The party and the
state apparatus is overrun with such swindlers, double-dealers,
and corrupt cynics. They are unreliable but indispensable:
bureaucratic absolutism, which has come into irreconcilable
contradiction with the economic and cultural requirements of the
workers' state, is in acute need of swindlers ready for anything.
Thus, Tarov's attempt to return to the ranks of the official
"party" met with complete failure. Tarov was left with no
recourse other than to flee from the Soviet Union. His experience,
for which he paid so dearly, is an invaluable lesson for both the
Soviet and the world proletariat. The Open Letter issued by the
organizations standing under the banner of the Fourth Interna
tional finds a new and a clear-cut confirmation in the Tarov case.
The Open Letter states: "By means of persecutions, frame-ups,
amalgams, and bloody repressions, the ruling clique seeks to nip
in the bud every manifestation of Marxist thought. Nowhere in
the world is genuine Leninism hounded so bestially as in the
USSR."
These lines, superficially considered, appear exaggerated: Isn't
Leninism being ruthlessly hounded in Italy and Germany? As a
matter of fact there is no exaggeration in the Open Letter. In
fascist countries the Leninists are subjected to persecution along
with other opponents of the regime. Hitler, as is well known,
vented his greatest malice upon his oppositionist brothers-in
arms in the party, the "left wing," which reminded him of his
own yesterday. 1 58 The Stalinist bureaucracy vents the same
bestial cruelty upon the Bolshevik-Leninists, the genuine revolu
tionists, who embody the traditions of the party and of the
October Revolution.
The political conclusions to be drawn from the case of Comrade
Tarov are quite evident. It would be sheer insanity to think of
The Terro r of B ureaucratic Self-Preservation 119
"reforming" and "regenerating" the CPSU today. A bureaucratic

machine which serves primarily the purpose of keeping the
proletariat in a vise cannot possibly be made to serve the
interests of the proletariat. Revolutionary terror, which during
the heroic period of the revolution served as a weapon in the
hands of the awakened masses against the oppressors, and as a
direct safeguard of the rule of the proletariat, has been completely
supplanted by the cold-blooded and venomous terror of the
bureaucracy, which fights like a mad beast for its posts and
sinecures, for its uncontrolled and autocratic rule-against the
proletarian vanguard. This is precisely why Stalinism is doomed!
On February 20, 1889, Engels wrote Kautsky a truly remark
able letter-published only recently-on the class relations
during the epoch of the Great French Revolution. Among other
things, it states the following: "As far as the Terror is concerned,
it was a war measure, insofar as it had a meaning. Not only did it
serve to maintain at the helm the class, or fraction of a class,
which alone could secure victory for the revolution (that was the
least thing after the victory over the uprisings), but also assured
it freedom of movement, elbow-room, the possibility of concentrat
ing its forces at the decisive points-the frontiers. " 1 59 But once
the frontiers had been safeguarded, thanks to military victories,
and after the destruction of the frenzied Commune, which had
sought to carry liberty to other peoples on bayonets, terror
outlived itself as a weapon of the revolution. Robespierre, it is
true, was at the height of his power;1 60 but, says Engels,
"hencefo rth terror became a means of self-preservatio n fo r him,
and thus it was reduced to an absurdity" (Engels's emphasis).
These lines are remarkable for their simplicity and profundity.
There is no need here to expatiate upon the distinction between
the present and the past epoch: it is quite well known. No less
clear is the difference betwen the historic roles played by
Robespierre and Stalin: the former assured the victory of the
revolution over its internal and foreign enemies during the most
critical period of its existence; but in Russia this work was
accomplished under the leadership of Lenin. Stalin came to the
forefront only after this period had come to a close. He is the
living embodiment of a bureaucratic Thermidor. In his hands,
terror was and remains primarily the instrument for crushing the
party, the trade unions , and the soviets, and for establishing a
personal dictatorship which lacks only . . . an imperial crown.
Terror, which has fulfilled its revolutionary mission and has
become transformed into a weapon of self-preservation for
usurpers, thus transforms itself into an " absurdity," to use

Engels's expression. In the language of dialectics this means that
it is doomed to inevitable collapse.
The senseless bestialities that grew out of bureaucratic methods
of collectivization, as well as the vile reprisals and violence
against the best elements of the proletarian vanguard, inevitably
arouse exasperation, hatred, and yearning for revenge. This
atmosphere engenders moods of individual terrorism among the
youth. The petty Ukrainian Bonaparte S. Kosior,161 famous for
his brazenness , said not long ago that Trotsky "calls in the press
for the assassination of Soviet leaders," while Zinoviev and
Kamenev-as proved, if you please, by the Yenukidze case
participated directly in the preparation of the Kirov assassina
tion. Since everybody who has access to the writings of Trotsky
can easily verify whether or not Trotsky has called for "the
assassination of Soviet leaders" (if one were to allow, in general,
that there are mature people who have to verify canards of this
sort), this itself casts sufficient light upon the other half of
Kosior's lie, that concerning Zinoviev and Kamenev. We do not
know whether there are now in process of manufacture any
fraudulent documents with the aid of "Latvian consuls" or
"Wrangel officers . " 1 62 The Kosiors of the Bonapartist regime are
still able to h ound, strangle, and shoot quite a number of
impeccable revolutionists, but this will not change the essence of
the matter: their terror is an historical absurdity. It will be swept
away together with its organizers.
Do we call for the assassination of the Soviet leaders? The
bureaucrats who have deified themselves may be sincerely under
the delusion that they are making history, but we on our part do
not share this illusion. Stalin did not create the apparatus. The
apparatus created Stalin-after its own image. The replacement
of Kirov by Zhdanov changed absolutely nothing in the state of
affairs. 163 Unlike the situation that prevails with goods for mass
consumption, the assortment of Kosiors is unlimited. They vary
from one another a centimeter or so in height and a few
centimeters in girth. That is all! In everything else they are as
alike as their o wn eulogies of Stalin. The replacement of Stalin
himself by one of the Kaganoviches would introduce almost as
little novelty as did the replacement of Kirov by Zhdanov.164 But
would a Kaganovich have sufficient "authority"? There is no
cause for worry; all the Kosiors-the first, the fifteenth, and the
one thousand and first-would immediately provide the neces
sary authority for him by means of the bureaucratic conveyor,
The Terror of Bureaucratic Self-Preservation 121
just as they created Stalin's "authority," i.e. , "authority" for

themselves, for their uncontrolled rule.
That is why individual terror appears so pathetic and puny in
our eyes. No, we have not unlearned the ABC of Marxism. Not
only the fate of the Soviet bureaucracy but the fate of the Soviet
regime as a whole depends on factors of a world historic
magnitude. Only successes on the part of the international
proletariat can restore self-confidence to the Soviet proletariat.
The basic condition for revolutionary successes is the unification
of the world proletarian vanguard around the banner of the
Fourth International. The struggle for this banner must be waged
in the USSR as well-prudently but unyieldingly. The historical
absurdity of an autocratic bureaucracy in a "classless" society
cannot and will not endlessly endure. The proletariat that has
achieved three revolutions will once again lift up its head. But
won't the bureaucratic "absurdity" resist? The proletariat will
find a large enough broom. And we shall assist them.
THE REVOLUTIONARY
INTERNATIONALISTS NEED OUR
HELPp65
S eptember 7 , 1935
The recently published letter of the Bolshevik-Leninist who

made his escape from the USSR depicts a horrible scene of
persecutions and reprisals on the part of the bureaucracy, and a
no less horrible picture of the physical straits in which hundreds
and thousands of devoted, unselfish, and self-sacrificing revolu
tionists find themselves . Recently their terms of exile and
imprisonment have been extended two, three, and even five years,
without any new charges whatsoever. A considerable number of
them have been in prison and exile since the beginning of 1928,
i.e., for a period of almost eight years. It is apparent even from
the official Soviet press that additional hundreds, if not
thousands, of old and young revolutionists have been subjected to
arrests, exile, and incarceration during the current year, for not
sharing the international policy of Stalin, or for merely
disapproving of his brutality with regard to Zinoviev, Kamenev,
and others.
Letters from exile received by relatives, as rare exceptions,
depict a situation that is hopeless and gives no sign of
imprQvement. For instance, an old revolutionist writes from exile:
"There is no sense in sending money here; it cannot be used
here. . . . Nothing is to be obtained here, not even vegetables."
Another exile, cut off from his friends for years, deprived of the
opportunity to correspond with his family, even with his children,
writes on a postcard which came through accidentally: "We are
on the road of the old Lafargues" -thus hinting at an attempt at
collective suicide, most probably through a hunger strike. 1 66 News
from prison arrives much more rarely than from exile, and
depicts new horrors, which leave far behind everything that
Stalin perpetrated during the first years of his struggle against
the Left Opposition. That is how matters stand.
1 22
The Internationalists Need Our Help! 123
Moral and material assistance must be given, and it is needed

immediately. The moral aid should consist in the exposure on the
widest scale possible of the Bonapartist bestialities to which the
captive revolutionists are being subjected. Any scrap of informa
tion that arrives must be given the widest possible circulation;
the attention and sympathy of the workers must be aroused for
those true heroes who have remained faithful to the banner of
revolutionary internationalism over a period of several years,
under conditions of complete isolation, cut off from all informa
tion and subjected to unheard-of privations. It is necessary to
protest openly and with all our might and main against the
Stalinist terror, which is directed not in defense of the revolution
against the class enemies but in defense of the autocratic rule of
the bureaucracy against the vanguard workers.
The material assistance must come in the form of collections of
funds for transmission to addresses in our possession: the men in
exile and in prison, wherever they are able, share the remitted
sums fraternally among themselves.
But agitation, protests, and collection of funds do not suffice. It
is necessary to provide constant and correct organizational
assistance to those revolutionary internationalists about whom
the Second and Third Internationals remain unconcerned, who
are ignored by the reformist trade unions, and whom the
bourgeoisie of the entire world rightly consider to be their
bitterest enemies.
The question, of course, is not restricted to the USSR. In China,
the prisons of Chiang Kai-shek, the former ally of Stalin, hold
numerous Bolshevik-Leninists, with Chen Tu-hsiu at their head
an old revolutionist, founder of the Communist Party, who is
serving an eleven-year prison term. 1 6 7 The leaders of the so-called
"united front" painstakingly avoid all reference to the very name
of Chen Tu-hsiu, a name that should, however, become known to
every revolutionary worker. In Germany, Italy, Spain, Poland,
Greece, Indochina, and a number of other countries, the fighters
for the Fourth International fill the jails and concentration
camps of the reactionary dictatorships in increasing numbers.
Even in Holland, the classic land of "democracy," revolutionary
internationalists like Sneevliet and Schmidt have paid a heavy
toll to the jails of capitalism during recent years.
However, concerned here are not only the Bolshevik-Leninists
and the fighters for the Fourth International. In the countries of
the old and new worlds, the numerous revolutionary organiza
tions and groups that stand outside both old Internationals and
124 Wri tings of Leon Trotsky (1 935-36)
that have not taken their place under the banner of the New
International count no few victims in their own ranks. The same
applies to the colonies. It suffices to name, for instance, the
Indian revolutionist Roy, now serving a fourteen-year j ail
sentence, who was shamefully betrayed by the Comintern, in
whose ranks he had fought.l68
The still closer drawing together of the Second and Third
Internationals , as well as the trade union bureaucracies, on a
common platform of soci a l patriotism-the ground for which was
laid by the Moscow congress-holds in store especially severe
trials for the proletarian fighters, who stand under the banner of
i nternationalism and revolutionary defeati s m. Screening them
selves by patriotic necessity, and even perhaps by concern for the
"defense of the USSR," the police and the prosecuting attorneys
of capital will henceforth deal the internationalists redoubled
blows , in order thus to remove the obstacles in the path of the
"united front" of Stalin-Laval-Cachin-Blum-Jouhaux,169 and also
in the path of . . . the new imperialist war. Whoever fails to see
this perspective is blind, or at any rate n earsighted. Revolution
ists must prepare themselves beforehand for supreme trials and
sacrifices.
The working class is divided into different political camps;
between those organizations which enter into neither the Second
nor the Third International there are also s erious disagreements.
These cannot be eliminated artificially. But if there is any sphere
in which honest revolutionary workers can and should combine
their efforts, it is in the organization of assistance to the fighters
who are captives of the bourgeoisie and who have been betrayed
by the social patriots . It is necessary to set immediately about
creating an international interparty association to give aid to the
revolutionists persecuted for their fidelity to the principles of
intern atio nalism.
All the parties and groups standing under the banner of the
Fourth International would of course readily join such an
organization. But this is not enough. It is necessary to come to an
agreement with all the other independent revolutionary parties,
as well as the left-wing minorities within the old Internationals
and the trade unions. The question is of a burning political
character. Great battles are ahead. It is necessary not only to
build the army, but also at the same time to prepare the Red
Cross and the sanitary corps.
THE STALIN IST TURN1 7 0
September 7, 1935
l owe an apology to the readers of our international press for

not having commented upon the Seventh Congress prior to now,
despite several reminders.n 1The causes for this lie beyond my
control. On the one hand, the debates at the congress were
extremely amorphous and intentionally diffuse, and on the other
hand, they were purely theatrical in character. The questions
were discussed and settled behind the scenes, often over the
telephone connecting the Kremlin with the Commissariat of
Foreign Affairs. There was some semblance of a conflict of
opinions within the narrow bureaucratic circle. However, once the
decision was finally reached by the Political Bureau, orators were
appointed who were instructed to present the decision in such a
manner as would least compromise the upper crust of the
Communist International, and, in any case, cast not the slightest
shadow upon the infallibility of the "Leader." What passed for
"discussion" at the congress amounts, in fact, to a long and, one
must add, a frightfully boring comedy, with roles cast before
hand. Moreover, the actors are rotten.
For this reason, the reports of the discussions must be
scrutinized in the same manner as one goes over diplomatic
documents, asking at every step the questions: What does the
orator really have in mind? What is he slurring over? And why?
Diplomatic documents are usually worded succinctly; the
speeches of the reporters at the congress, however, are inordinate
ly long. The wearisome scope of the reports provides an added
measure of bureaucratic self-insurance: it is necessary to let loose
the greatest possible number of the least precise assertions
possible, without getting embarrassed over their contradictory
nature. One never can tell precisely which of these assertions will
come in handy in the future. Then, add to this the frightfully bad
newspaper accounts. Where clear thinking and a political will
obtain, when an open ideological struggle takes place, which is
always an aid to precision of thought, the form of presentation
125
126 Writings of Leon Tro tsky (1 935-36)
can be clear, good, and convincing; but when a functionary-orator

is busy covering up his own tracks, and those of his superiors,
and when the functionary-journalist retails the muddled speech
in constant panic lest he run afoul of a submarine reef, then the
newspaper reports inevitably amount to a miserable hash of
generalities poorly strung together_ Such are the reports in
l'Humanite which I have had to use up to now. When, for
instance, I sought on the basis of these reports to determine even
approximately what the working class movement in Japan
amounts to, under the conditions of the present-day Far East
crisis, and the role played in it by the Communist Party of Japan,
I was able to establish conclusively only one fact, namely, that in
Japanese the impassioned love for the Leader is expressed by the
word, "Banzai!" But I was already equipped with this piece of
information, since it is proper to yell "Banzai!" in honor of the
Mikado as well. Incidentally, at the congress, Stalin scintillated
in silence, also after the Mikado's fashion.
The so-called "discussions" revolved around two questions: the
policy of the "united front" (today, that is the only policy in
existence) against fascism, and the s ame policy against war. The
speeches of the reporters, the fulsome and flat report of Dimitrov
as well as j esuitical sophistry of Ercoli , 1 72 added nothing to those
asseverations which during recent months flooded the press of
the C ommunist International, particularly in France. The
experience of the French Communist P arty occupied the center of
the stage, and it was boosted as an exemplar worthy of
emulation. But it was precisely upon the basic questions before
the congress that the organizations of the Fourth International
had already expressed themselves quite adequately. In the light
of the debates at Moscow, we, the revolutionary Marxists, do not
have to change a single line in all we have hitherto said on the
questions of war, fascism, the "united front," and the "People's
Front. "
This does not a t all mean t o say that w e can disregard the
Seventh Congress. Far from it! Whether the debates be brimful of
meaning or hollow, the congress itself represents a stage in the
evolution of a certain section of the working class. It is important
if only for the fact that by legalizing the opportunistic turn in
France, it immediately transplants it to the rest of the world. We
have a curious specimen of bureaucratic thinking in that while
granting, on paper at any rate, a liberal autonomy to all sections,
and while even issuing instructions to them to do independent
thinking and adapt themselves to their own national conditions,
the congress, immediately thereupon, proclaimed that all coun-
The Stalinist Turn 127
tries in the world, fascist Germany as well as democratic Norway,

Great Britain as well as India, Greece as well as China, are
equally in need of the "People's Front," and, wherever possible, a
government of the People's Front. The congress is important
because it marks-after a period of vacillation and fumbling-the
final entry of the Communist International into its "fourth
period," which has for its slogan, "Power to Daladier!"-for its
banner, a tricolor-for its hymn, the "Marseillaise," drowning out
the "Internationale."
In any case, the resolutions would have provided a great deal
more than the verbose discussions toward the appraisal of the
depth of the turn and its concrete content pertaining to conditions
in different countries. The drafts of the resolutions, however, were
not published beforehand upon a single one of the questions that
were discussed. The discussions did not take place around
definitive documents, but seeped over an illimitable expanse. The
special committee busied itself with drafting the resolutions only
after all the orators had bellowed praise to the Leader and begun
packing their bags. It is an unprecedented fact: the official
congress adjourned without arriving at any decisions. This job
has been left to the new leaders, appointed prior to the congress
(Dimitrov!), who are to take into consideration, insofar as
possible, the moods and wishes of the honorable delegates. Thus,
the very mechanics of this congress made it extremely difficult to
give any sort of a timely critical evaluation of its labors. Today,
at any rate, the principal material of the congress has been
published, and thus, at last, it is possible to draw up theoretical
and political balance sheets. I will try to fulfill this task as soon
as possible in a special pamphlet or series of articles. At this time,
I should like to sketch in advance a few political conclusions in
connection with the turn of the Communist International, which
was sealed at the congress.
It would be a fatal mistake on our part to think that the theory
and practice of the "third period" has been entirely and
painlessly liquidated by the "self-criticism" of the leaders, and
that the opportunistic and patriotic turn is guaranteed a cloudless
future. While the bureaucracy has consigned to the flames all it
so highly revered with such scandalous ease, it is otherwise with
the masses. Their attitude toward slogans is more serious and
genuine. The moods of the "third period" are still entirely alive in
the consciousness of those workers who follow the Communist
International. And precisely these moods were in evidence among
the French Communists in Toulon and Brest. The leaders were
able to curb the opposition of the rank and file for a time only by
giving "secret'" assurances on their oath that here was involved

a cunning maneuver aimed to hoodwink the Radicals and the
Socialists, take the masses away from them, and then . . . " then
we will show ourselves for what we are." On the other hand, the
procoalition and patriotic turn of the Communist Party is
attracting to it the sympathy of new strata considerably removed
from the working class, those who are very patriotic and very
much dissatisfied with the financial decrees and who see in the
Communist Party only the most energetic wing of the People's
Front. This means that inside the Communi s t Party and on i ts
periphery are accumulating to an increasi ng degree contradi ctory
tendenci es, which must lead to an explosion or series of
explosions. From this flows the duty for the organizations of the
Fourth International to follow most attentively the internal life of
the Communist parties in order to support the revolutionary
proletarian tendency against the leading social-patriotic faction,
which will henceforth become more and more enmeshed in the
attempts of class collaboration .
Our second conclusion touches upon centrist groupings and
their relation to the strategic turn of the Communist Internation
al. The right-centris t elements will inevitably be attracted by this
turn as though by a magnet. One need only read the theses on
war by Otto Bauer, Zyromsky, and the Russian Menshevik
Dan , 1 73 to see clearly that it is precisely these consummate
representatives of the golden mean who have expressed the very
essence of the Comintern's new policy better than Dimitrov and
Ercoli. But not they alone. The field of magnetic attraction also
extends further to the left. Die Neue Front, the organ of the SAP,
in its last two issues (16 and 17), while screening itself behJnd a
pile of cautious qualifications and warnings, in essence hails the
opportunistic turn of the C ommunist International, as its
emancipation from sectarian ossification, and its transition to
the road of "more realistic" policy. How ill-j udged are all the
discussions to the effect that the SAP is supposedly in agreement
with us on all the principled questions, but merely disapproves of
our "methods . " In reality, every major question reveals the
incongruity between their principled position and ours . The
impending war danger impelled the SAP to advance immediately,
against our slogans, the demoralizing slogan of "disarmament,"
which is rejected even by Otto Bauer, Zyromsky, and Dan as
"unrealistic. " The same clash of positions became manifest in the
evaluation of the evolution of the Communist International. In
the very heat of the "third period" we forecasted with absolute
precision that this paroxysm of ultraleftism would inevitably lead
The Stalinist Turn 1 29
to a new opportunistic zigzag, immeasurably more profound and

fatal than all those preceding. In the days when the Communist
International still played motley variations on the theme of
"revolutionary defeatism, " we warned that from the theory of
"socialism in a single country" would inevitably flow social
patriotic conclusions with all their treacherous consequences. The
Seventh Congress of the Comintern provided a truly remarkable
confirmation of the Marxian prognosis. And what happened? The
leaders of the SAP, who have forgotten everything and learned
nothing, hail the new and severest stage of an incurable disease,
discovering in it symptoms . . . of a realistic convalescence. Isn't
it clear that we have two irreconcilable positions before us?
From the above-indicated point of view, it will be in the highest
degree interesting to see what will be the precise reaction to the
Seventh Congress of that left centrist party which has hitherto
been closest to the Communist International, namely, the ILP of
England. 1 74 Will it be attracted by the vile "realism" of the
Seventh Congress ("united front," "masses, " "middle classes, "
etc. , etc.) o r will it, o n the contrary, b e repelled b y the belated and
all the more fatal opportunism (class collaboration under the
hollow banner of "antifascism," social patriotism under the cover
of "defense of the USSR," etc.)? The fate of the ILP hinges upon
this choice.
One may say, in general, that regardless of the isolated partial
stages and episodes, the turn of the Communist International
sealed by the congress simplifies the situation in the working
class movement. It consolidates the social-patriotic camp,
bringing closer the parties of the Second and Third Internation
als, regardless of how matters proceed with organizational unity.
It strengthens the centrifugal tendencies within the centrist
groupings. To the revolutionary internationalists, i.e. , the
builders of the Fourth International, it opens up all the greater
possibilities.
RUSSIA AND
THE WORLD PROLETARIAT 1 75
September 1 4 , 1 935
The resolution on Dimitrov's report on fascism is finally here.

It is just as longwinded and diffuse as the report itself. Here we
will deal only with the first sentence of the first paragraph of the
resolution, which takes up a bare dozen newspaper lines of
l'H umanite, but which at the same time constitutes the corner
stone of the whole theoretical and strategic structure of the so
called Communist International.
Let us examine a little more closely what this cornerstone is
like. We quote this first sentence literally: "The final, irrevocable
v ictory of socialism in the land of the Soviets, a victory of world
historical significance, has enormously enhanced the power and
the importance of the Soviet Union as the rampart of the
exploited and oppressed of the entire world and has inspired the
toilers to the struggle against capitalist exploitation, bourgeois
reaction, and fascism, and for peace, freedom, and the indepen
dence of the peoples."
The assertions contained in this sentence, however categorical
they may sound, are false to the core. What is the "final,
irrevocable victory of socialism in the land of the Soviets"
supposed to mean? No official theoretician has tried to explain it
to us. The resolution also spares itself the slightest hint of the
criteria upon which this assertion is based. We must therefore call
to mind all over again the ABC of Marxism. The victory of
socialism, especially the "final, irrevocable" one, can only consist
in this, that the average productivity of every member of the
socialist society is higher, even substantially higher, than that of
a capitalist worker. Even the most daring Comintern theoretician
will not venture such an assertion with regard to the USSR. We
hope to establish statistically in the near future the still very
great backwardness of the Soviet Union with respect to both
national and individual incomes. Our present task requires no
such proof. The fact that the Soviet government must hold fast to
1 30
Russia and the World Proletariat 131
the monopoly of foreign trade, represents a sufficient confirma

tion of the existing backwardness-despite all the successes-of
the Soviet economy. For if the costs of production in the country
were lower than the capitalist costs, the monopoly of foreign
trade would be superfluous. The latest reform of foreign trade,
interpreted by many all-too-superficial observers as a surrender of
the foreign trade monopoly, is in reality only a technico
bureaucratic reform, which does not in the least infringe upon the
basic pillars of the monopoly. Since, on the other hand, the Soviet
bureaucracy has based itself upon nationalized means of
production since the introduction of the five year plan and
collectivization, and, on the other hand, the Soviet product is still
much more expensive than the capitalist one, the Soviet
bureaucracy, for the sake of its own preservation, cannot
abandon the foreign trade monopoly. This decisive fact-the low
productivity of labor power in the Soviet Union-provides the key
that puts us in a position to open up all the other secrets.
If the per capita national income in the USSR were approxi
mately as high as in the United States of America, and if the
bureaucracy did not squander unproductively and consume
parasitically much too large a part of it, then the standard of
living of the population would have to be incomparably higher
than in the capitalist countries, the United States included. But
that is not the case in the slightest degree. The Russian peasant,
that is, the overwhelming mass of the population, still lives in
deep poverty. Even the position of the majority of the industrial
proletariat has not yet attained the American, or even the
European, level. The honest establishment of this fact naturally
says nothing, in any respect, against the socialist mode of
production, for in the case of capitalism we are dealing with a
decomposing system and in the case of socialism with one which
is just in its incipiency. We ought not, however, content ourselves
with the general tendencies of development, but characterize
quite accurately the stage attained, lest we lose ourselves in
meaningless commonplaces.
If the socialist society gave its members a halfway assured
well-being, with the perspective of an uninterrupted improvement
of the position of everyone, then the burning worries about
individual existence would begin to vanish; greed, anxiety, and
envy would make their appearance merely as increasingly rare
remnants of the old state of affairs; economic solidarity would
pass from a principle into a daily custom. That this is not the
case in the least hardly needs to be proved: the creation of a
semiprivileged labor aristocracy under the fully privileged Soviet

bureaucracy; the endeavors to translate all relationships among
men into the language of money; the draconian laws for the
protection of state property; finally, the truly barbaric law
against "criminal" children; all these prove in the most striking,
most irrefutable manner that socialism is still far from "irrevoc
ably" assured in that field which is decisive precisely for
socialism: in the conscio usness of the people.
If socialism has "finally, irrevocably" triumphed, as the
resolution dares to assert, then why does the political dictatorship
continue to exist? Still more, why does it congeal with every
passing day into a bureaucratic-Bonapartist regime of insuffer
able harshness, arbitrariness, and rottenness? A guaranteed,
"irrevocably" rooted socialism cannot possibly require an
omnipotent bureaucracy, with an absolute ruler on top of it, for
the dictatorship in general is after all nothing but a state means
of preserving and protecting the menaced and not the assured
foundations of the socialist state. The intrepid attempt of many
"theoreticians" to refer to external dangers is much too absurd to
be taken seriously. A society whose socialist structure is assured,
whose internal relations thus repose upon the solidarity of the
overwhelming mass, does not require an internal dictatorship for
protection from external foes, but only a technico-military
apparatus, just as it requires a technico-economic apparatus for
its welfare.
Also, the fear of war in which the Soviet bureaucracy lives, and
which determines its whole international policy, can only be
explained by the fact that socialist construction, upon which the
Soviet bureaucracy bases itself, is, historically speaking, not yet
assured. The struggle of the workers' state against a menacing
capitalism is-at least it should be-a component part of the class
struggle of the international working class. War thus has-at
least it should have-the same significance for the workers' state
as revolution has for the proletariat of the capitalist countries. We
are of course against any "premature," artificially evoked
revolution because, given an unfavorable relation of forces, it can
lead only to defeat. The same holds true of war. A workers' state
should avert it only if it is "premature," that is, if socialism is not
yet finally and irrevocably assured. The current view that
internally socialism is assured but that it may be crushed by
military force is senseless: an economic system which effects a
higher productivity of human labor cannot be overthrown by
military measures. The victory of the semifeudal European
coalition over Napoleon did not lead to the destruction of
Russia and the World Proletariat 133
France's capitalist development but to its acceleration in the rest

of Europe. History teaches that the victors-should they be
situated on a lower economic and cultural plane than the
vanquished-take over the latter's technology, social relation
ships, and culture. It is not military force as such that menaces
Soviet socialism, but the cheap commodities which would follow
on the heels of the victorious capitalist armies. Moreover, if
socialism really were assured in the Soviet Union in the above
described manner, that is, higher technology, higher productivity,
higher well-being of the whole population, higher solidarity, there
could be no possible talk of a military victory of the internally
torn capitalist states over the Soviet Union.
We thus see how thoroughly false is the most important, the

really decisive contention of the Seventh World Congress.
Revolutionary Marxists would have said: the technical successes
in the USSR are very significant; the economic successes lag
behind. To guarantee even that "well-being" which obtains in the
advanced capitalist countries and to reeducate the population,
many years are still required, even if one disregards the internal
contradictions and the increasingly destructive role of the Soviet
bureaucracy, that is, two factors which are by themselves capable
of demolishing the not-yet-assured social achievements. The
decomposition of capitalism, the thrust of fascism, the growing
war danger-all these processes stride forward much more
rapidly than the construction of socialism in the USSR. Only
narrow-minded fakers and bureaucratic pietists can think that
this candid and honest posing of the question will dampen the
"enthusiasm" of the international working class. Revolutionary
enthusiasm cannot be permanently nurtured on lies. But lies form
the basic pillar of the strategic system of the Comintern.
Socialism is irrevocably assured in the USSR, on one-sixth of the
world's surface, if only the world proletariat will help to leave the
Soviet state in peace. Thus the slogan is not preparation for the
international revolution, but the assurance of peace. Thence the
alliance with the "friends of peace," the substitution of class
collaboration for class struggle, the creation of the People's Front
with the Radical parties of finance capital, etc. , etc. All these
means are, in themselves, incapable of prolonging the peace, to
say nothing of assuring it. Yet the whole peace program of the
Comintern is strategically built upon the premise of an internally
"assured" socialism. With this premise, the Seventh World
Congress stands and falls; and it is, as indicated above,
irrevocably false.
THE ILP AND
THE FOURTH INTERNATIONAL 17 6
In the Middle of the Road
September 18, 1 9 3 5
I f w e were t o leave aside the Revolutionary Socialist Workers

Party (RSAP) of Holland, which stands under the banner of the
Fourth International, we could surely say that the ILP of Britain
stands on the left wing of the parties that adhere to the London
Amsterdam Bureau. In contrast to the SAP, which has shifted
recently to the right, to the side of crassest petty-bourgeois
pacifism, the ILP has undoubtedly undergone a serious evolution
to the left. This became definitely revealed by Mussolini's
predatory assault upon Ethiopia. On the question of the League
of Nations, on the role played in it by British imperialism, and on
the "peaceful" policy of the Labour Party, the New Leader has
perhaps carried the best articles in the entire labor press. But a
single swallow does not make a spring, nor do a few excellent
articles determine as yet the policy of a party. It is comparatively
easy to take a "revolutionary" position on the question of war;
but it is extremely difficult to draw from this position all the
necessary theoretical and practical conclusions. Yet this is
precisely the task.
Compromised by the experience of 1 91 4-18, social patriotism
has today found a new source to feed from, namely, Stalinism.
Thanks to this, bourgeois chauvinism obtains the opportunity to
unleash a rabid attack against the revolutionary international
ists. The vacillating elements, the so-called centrists, will
capitulate inevitably to the onset of chauvinism on the eve of the
war, or the moment it breaks out. To be sure, they will take cover
behind the argument of "unity," the need not to break away from
mass organizations, and so on. The formulas of hypocrisy, which
supply the centrists with a screen for their cowardice in the face
of bourgeois public opinion, are quite diversified, but they all
134
The ILP and the Fourth International 135
serve the same purpose: to cover up capitulation. "Unity" with

the social patriots-not a temporary coexistence with them in a
common organization with a view to waging a struggle against
them, but unity as a principle-is unity with one's own
imperialism, and consequently, an open split with the proletariat
of other nations. The centrist principle of unity at any price
prepares for the most malignant split possible, along the lines of
imperialist contradictions. Even today, we can observe in France
the Spartacus group, which translates into the French language
the ideas of the SAP, advocating, in the name of "unity" with the
masses, political capitulation to Blum, who was, and remains, the
chief agent of French imperialism within the working class.
Mter its split with the Labour Party, the ILP came into close
contact with the British Communist Party and, through it, with
the Communist International. The acute financial difficulties
under which the New Leader labors right now indicate that the
ILP was able to preserve complete financial independence from
the Soviet bureaucracy and its methods of corrupting. This can
only be a source of gratification. Nevertheless, the connection
,'lith the Communist Party did not pass without leaving a trace:
despite its name, the ILP did not become really independent but
turned into a sort of appendage to the Communist International.
It did not pay the necessary attention to mass work, which
cannot be carried on outside of the trade unions and the Labour
Party; instead it was seduced by the Amsterdam-Pleyel masquer
ade, the Anti-Imperialist League, and other surrogates for
revolutionary activity. l 77 As a result, it appeared to the workers to
be a Communist party of the second o rder. So disadvantageous a
position for the ILP did not arise accidentally: it was conditioned
by its lack of a firm principled basis. It is a secret to nobody that
Stalinism long overawed the leaders of the ILP with those rubber
stamp formulas which comprise the miserable bureaucratic
falsification of Leninism .
More than two years ago the writer o f this article sought to
arrive at an understanding with the leaders of the ILP by means
of several articles and letters. The attempt was barren of results:
during that period, our criticism of the Communist International
seemed to the leaders of the ILP to be "preconceived," and
"factionally," perhaps even "personally," motivated . 1 78 Nothing
remained except to yield the floor to time. For the ILP, the last
two years have been scanty in successes, but bountiful in
experience. The social-patriotic degeneration of the C ommunist
International, the direct consequence of the theory and practice of
"socialism in one country," was turned from a forecast into a
living, incontestable fact. Have the leaders of the ILP fully

plumbed the meaning of this fact? Are they ready and able to
draw all the necessary conclusions from it? The future of the ILP
depends upon the answer to these questions.
From pacifism toward proletarian revolution-such has indu
bitably been the general tendency of the evolution of the ILP. But
this development has far from reached a rounded-out program as
yet. Worse yet: not uninfluenced by the hoary and expert
opportunistic combinations of the German SAP, the leaders of the
ILP have apparently halted in the middle of the road, and keep
marking time.
In the following critical lines, we intend to dwell primarily
upon two questions: the attitude of the ILP toward the general
strike in connection with the struggle against war, and the
position of the ILP on the question of the International. In the
latter as well as in the former question there are to be found
elements of a halfway attitude: on the question of the general
strike this hesitancy assumes the guise of irresponsible radical
phraseology; on the question of the International hesitancy pulls
up short of the radical decision. And yet Marxism, and Leninism
as the direct continuation of its doctrine, are absolutely
irreconcilable both with an inclination to radical phraseology,
and with the dread of radical decisions.
The question of the general strike has a long and rich history,
in theory as well as practice. Yet the leaders of the ILP behave as
if they were the first to run across the idea of general strike as a
way to stop war. In this is their greatest error. Improvisation is
impermissible precisely on the question of the general strike. The
world experience of the struggle during the last forty years has
been fundamentally a confirmation of what Engels had to say
about the general strike toward the close of the last century,
primarily on the basis of experience of the Chartists and, in part,
the Belgians. 1 79 Cautioning the Austrian Social Democrats
against a much too flighty attitude toward the general strike,
Engels wrote to Kautsky on November 3, 1893, as follows: "You
yourself remark that the barricades have become antiquated
(they may, however, prove useful again should the army turn one
third or two-fifths socialist and should the question arise of
providing it with the opportunity to turn its bayonets), but the
political strike must either prove victorious immediately by the
threat alone (as in Belgium, where the army was very shaky), or
it must end in a colossal fiasco, or, finally, lead directly to the
barricades. "
These terse lines provide, incidentally, a remarkable exposition
of Engels's views on a number of questions. Innumerable

controversies raged over Engels's famous introduction to Marx's
The Class Struggles in France ( 1 895), an introduction which was
in its time modified and cut in Germany with a view to
censorship. Philistines of every stripe have asserted hundreds
and thousands of times during the last forty years that "Engels
himself' had apparently rejected once and for all the ancient
"romantic" methods of street fighting. But there is no need to
refer to the past: one need only read on this subject the
contemporary and inordinately ignorant and mawkish discourses
of Paul Faure, Lebas, and others, who are of the opinion that the
very question of armed insurrection is "Blanquism. " 1 8o However,
if Engels rejected anything, it was first of all putsches, i.e.,
untimely flurries of a s mall minority; and secondly antiquated
methods, that is to say, forms and methods of street fighting
which did not correspond to the new technological conditions.
In the above-quoted letter, Engels corrects Kautsky, in passing,
as if he were referring to something self-evident: barricades have
become "antiquated" only in the sense that the bourgeois
revolution has receded into the past, and the time for the socialist
barricades has not come as yet. It is necessary for the army, one
third, or better still, two-fifths of it (these ratios, of course, are
given only for the sake of illustration), to become imbued with
sympathy for socialism; then the insurrection would not be a
"putsch" ; then the barricades would once again come into their
own-not the barricades of the year 1848, to be sure, but the
"new" barricades, serving, however, the same goal: to check the
offensive of the army against the workers, to give the soldiers the
opportunity and the time to sense the power of the uprising, and
by this to create the most advantageous conditions for the army
to pass over to the side of the insurrectionists.
How far removed are these lines of Engels-not the youth, but
the man, seventy-three years of agel-from the asinine and
reactionary attitude to the barricade as a piece of "romanticism"!
Kautsky has found the leisure to publish this remarkable letter
just recently, in 1935! Without engaging in a direct polemic with
Engels, whom he never understood fully, Kautsky tells us
smugly, in a special note, that toward the end of 1893, he had
himself published an article in which he "developed the
advantages of the democratic-proletarian method of struggle in
democratic countries as against the policy of violence." These
remarks about "advantages" (as if the proletariat has the
freedom of choice!) have a particularly choice ring in our day,
after the policies of the Weimar democracy, not without
138 Writings of Leo n Tro tsky (1935-36)
Kautsky's cooperation, have fully revealed all their . . . disadvan

tages. l 81 To leave no room for doubt as to his own attitude on
Engels's views, Kautsky goes on to add: "I defended then the
same policy I defend today." In order to defend "the same policy"
Kautsky needed only to become a citizen of Czechoslovakia:
outside of the passport, nothing has changed.
But let us return to Engels. He differentiates, as we have seen,
between three cases in relation to the political strike:
1. The government takes fright at the general strike, and at the
very outset, without carrying matters to an open clash, makes
concessions. Engels points to the "shaky" condition of the army
in Belgium as the basic condition for the success of the Belgian
general strike (1893). A somewhat similar situation but on a
much more colossal scale, occurred in Russia in October 1905.
After the miserable outcome of the Russo-Japanese War, the
czarist army was-or, at any rate, seemed-extremely unreliable.
The P etersburg government, thrown into a morlal panic by the
strike, made the first constitutional concessions (Manifesto of
October 1 7, 1905). 182
It is all too evident, however, that unless the workers resort to
decisive battles, the ruling class will make only such concessions
as will not touch the basis of its rule. That is precisely how
matters stood in Belgium and Russia. Are such cases possible in
the future? They are inevitable in the countries of the East. They
are, generally speaking, less probable in the countries of the
West, although here too they are quite possible as partial episodes
of the unfolding revolution.
2. If the army is sufficiently reliable, and the government feels
sure of itself; if a political strike is promulgated from above; and
if, at the same time, it is calculated not for decisive battles, but to
"frighten" the enemy; then it can easily turn out a mere
adventure, and reveal its utter impotence. To this we ought to add
that after the initial experiences of the general strike, the novelty
of which reacted upon the imagination of the popular masses as
well as governments, several decades have elapsed-discounting
the half-forgotten Chartists-in the course of which the strate
gists of capital have accumulated an enormous experience. That
is why a general strike, particularly in the old capitalist
countries, requires a painstaking Marxist accounting of all the
concrete circumstances.
3. Finally, there remains a general strike which, as Engels put
it, "leads directly to the barricades." A strike of this sort can
result either in complete victory or in defeat. But to shy away
from battle, when the battle is forced by the obj ective situation, is
The ILP and the Fourth International 1 39
to lead inevitably to the most fatal and demoralizing of all

possible defeats. The outcome of a revolutionary, insurrectionary
general strike depends, of course, upon the relationship of forces,
covering a great I)umber of factors: the class differentiation of
society, the specific weight of the proletariat, the mood of the
lower layers of the petty bourgeoisie, the social composition and
the political mood of the army, etc. However, among the
conditions for victory, far from the last place is occupied by the
correct revolutionary leadership and its clear understanding of
the conditions and methods of the general strike and of its
transition to open revolutionary struggle.
Engels's classification must not, of course, be taken dogmati
cally. In present-day France not partial concessions but power
is indubitably in question: the revolutionary proletariat or
fascism-which? The working class masses want to struggle. But
the leadership applies the brakes, hoodwinks and demoralizes the
workers. A general strike can flare up just as the movements
flared up in Toulon and Brest. Under these conditions, indepen
dently of its immediate results, a general strike will not of course
be a "putsch" but a necessary stage in the mass struggle, the
necessary means for casting off the treachery of the leadership
and for creating within the working class itself the preliminary
conditions for a victorious uprising. In this sense the policy of the
French Bolshevik-Leninists, who have advanced the slogan of
general strike, and who explain the conditions for its victory, is
entirely correct. The French cousins of the SAP, the Spartacists,
who at the beginning of the struggle are already assuming the
role of strikebreakers, come out against this slogan.
We should also add that Engels did not point out another
"category" of general strike, examples of which have been
provided in England, Belgium, France, and some other countries:
we refer here to cases in which the leadership of the strike
previously, i.e. , without a struggle, arrives at an agreement with
the class enemy as to the course and outcome of the strike. The
parliamentarians and the trade unionists perceive at a given
moment the need to provide an outlet for the accumulated ire of
the masses, or they are simply compelled to jump in step with a
movement that has flared over their heads. In such cases they
come scurrying through the backstairs to the government and
obtain permission to head the general strike, this with the
obligation to conclude it as soon as possible, without any damage
being done to the state crockery. Sometimes, far from always,
they manage to haggle beforehand some petty concessions, to
serve them as figleaves. Thus did the General Council of British
Trades Unions (TUC) in 1926. Thus did Jouhaux in 1934. Thus

will they act in the future also. The exposure of these contempt
ible machinations behind the backs of the struggling proletariat
enters as a necessary part into the preparation of a general strike.
To which type does a general strike belong which is specially
intended by the ILP in the event of mobilization as a means to
stop war at the very outset? We want to say beforehand: it
pertains to the most ill-considered and unfortunate of all types
possible. This does not mean to say that the revolution can never
coincide with mobilization or with the outbreak of war. If a large
scale revolutionary movement is developing in a country, if at its
head is a revolutionary party possessing the confidence of the
masses and capable of going through to the end; if the
government, losing its head, despite the revolutionary crisis, or
just because of such a crisis, plunges headlong into a war
adventure-then the mobilization can act as a mighty impetus for
the masses, lead to a general strike of railwaymen, fraternization
between the mobilized and the workers, seizure of important key
centers, clashes between insurrectionists and the police and the
reactionary sections of the army, the establishment of local
workers' and soldiers' councils, and finally the complete over
throw of the government, and consequently, to stopping the war.
Such a case is theoretically possible. If, in the words of
Clausewitz, "war is the continuation of politics by other means,"
then the struggle against war is also the continuation of the
entire preceding policy of a revolutionary class and its party.
Hence it follows that a general strike can be put on the agenda
as a method of struggle against mobilization and war only in the
event that the entire preceding developments in the country have
placed revolution and armed insurrection on the agenda. Taken,
however, as a "special" method of struggle against mobilization,
a general strike would be a sheer adventure. Excluding a possible
but nevertheless exceptional case of a government plunging into
war in order to escape from a revolution that directly threatens it,
it must remain as a general rule that precisely prior to, during,
and after mobilization the government feels itself strongest, and
consequently is least inclined to allow itself to be scared by a
general strike. The patriotic moods that accompany mobilization,
together with the war terror, make hopeless the very execution of
a general strike, as a rule. The most intrepid elements who,
without taking the circumstances into account, plunge into the
struggle would be crushed. The defeat and the partial annihila
tion of the vanguard would make revolutionary work difficult for
a long time in the atmosphere of dissatisfaction that war breeds.
A strike called artificially must turn inevitably into a putsch, and

into an obstacle in the path of the revolution.
In its theses accepted in April 1935, the ILP writes as follows:
"The policy of the party aims at the use of a general s trike to stop
war and at social revolution should war occur. " An astonishingly
precise but-sad to say-absolutely fictitious obligation! The
general strike is not only separated here from the social
revolution but also counterposed to it as a specific method to
"stop war." This is an ancient conception of the anarchists,
which life itself smashed long ago. A general strike without a
victorious insurrection cannot "stop war." If, under the condi
tions of mobilization, the insurrection is impossible, then so is a
general strike impossible.
In an ensuing paragraph we read: "The ILP will urge a general
strike against the British government, if this country is in any
way involved in an attack on the Soviet Union. . . . " If it is
possible to forestall any war by a general strike, then of course it
is all the more necessary to stop a war against the USSR. But
here we enter into the realm of illusions: to inscribe in the theses
a general strike as punishment for a given capital crime of the
government is to commit the sin of revolutionary phrasemonger
ing. If it were possible to call a general strike at will, then it
would be best called today to prevent the British government
from strangling India and from collaborating with Japan to
strangle China. The leaders of the ILP will of course tell us that
they have not the power to do so. But nothing gives them the
right to promise that they will apparently have the power to call
a general strike on the day of mobilization. And if they are able,
why confine it to a strike? As a matter of fact, the conduct of a
party during mobilization will flow from its preceding successes
and from the situation in the country as a whole. But the aim of
revolutionary policy should not be an isolated general strike, as a
special means to "stop war," but the proletarian revolution, into
which a general strike will enter as an inevitable or a very
probable integral part.
The ILP split from the Labour Party chiefly for the sake of
keeping the independence of its parliamentary fraction. We do
not intend here to discuss whether the split was correct at the
given moment, and whether the ILP gleaned from it the expected
advantages. We don't think so. But it remains a fact about every
revolutionary organization in England that its attitude to the
masses and to the class is almost coincident with its attitude
toward the Labour Party, which bases itself upon the trade
unions. At this time, the question of whether to function inside
the Labour Party or outside it is not a principled question, but a

question of actual opportunities.In any case, without a strong
fraction i the trade unions, and consequently in the Labour
Party itself, the ILP is doomed to impotence even today. Yet, for a
long period the ILP attached much greater importance to the
"united front" with the insignificant Communist Party than to
work in mass organizations.The leaders of the ILP consider the
policy of the opposition wing in the Labour Party incorrect out of
considerations which are absolutely unexpected: "they (the
opposition) criticize the leadership and policy of the party but,
owing to the bloc vote and the form of organization of the party,
they cannot change the personnel and policy of the executive and
parliamentary party within the period necessary to resist
capitalist reaction, fascism, and war" (p.8).
The policy of the opposition in the Labour Party is unspeakably
bad. But this only means that it is necessary to counterpose to it
inside the Labour Party another, a correct Marxist policy.That
isn't so easy? Of course not! But one must know how to hide one's
activities from the police vigilance of Sir Walter Citrine and his
agents until the proper time.But isn't it a fact that a Marxist
faction would not succeed in changing the structure and policy of
the Labour Party? With this we are entirely in accord: the
bureaucracy will not surrender. But the revolutionists, function
ing outside and inside, can and must succeed in winning over
tens and hundreds of thousands of workers. The criticism
directed by the ILP against the left-wing faction in the Labour
Party is of an obviously artificial character. One would have
much more reason for saying that the tiny ILP, by involving
itself with the compromised Communist Party and thus drawing
away from the mass organizations, hasn't a chance to become a
mass party "within the period necessary to resist capitalist
reaction, fascism, and war. "
Thus the ILP considers it necessary for a revolutionary
organization to exist independently within the national frame
work even at the present time. Marxist logic, it would seem,
demands that this consideration be applied to the international
arena as well. A struggle against war and for revolution is
unthinkable without the International. The ILP deems it
necessary for it to exist side by side with the Communist Party,
and consequently against the Communist Party, and by this very
fact it recognizes the need of creating against the Communist
International-a new International.Yet the ILP dares not draw
this conclusion.Why?
If in the opinion of the ILP the Comintern could be reformed, it
would be its duty to join its ranks and work for this reform. If,
however, the ILP has become convinced that the Comintern is
incorrigible, it is its duty to join with us in the struggle for the
Fourth International. The ILP does neither. It halts midway. It is
bent on maintaining a "friendly collaboration" with the Commu
nist International. If it is invited to the next congress of the
Communist International-such is the literal wording of its April
theses of this year!-it will there fight for its position and in the
interests of the "unity of revolutionary socialism." Evidently, the
ILP expected to be "invited" to the International. This means
that its psychology in relation to the International is that of a
guest, and not of a host. But the Comintern did not invite the
ILP. What to do now?
It is necessary to understand first of all that really independent
workers' parties-independent not only of the bourgeoisie, but
also of both bankrupt Internationals-cannot be built unless
there is a close international bond between them, on the basis of
the same principles, and provided there is a living interchange of
experience and vigilant mutual control. The notion that national
parties (which ones? on what basis?) must be established first,
and coalesced only later into a new International (how will a
common principled basis then be guaranteed?) is a caricature of
the history of the Second International: the First and Third
Internationals were both built differently. But today, under the
conditions of the imperialist epoch, after the proletarian van
guard of all countries in the world has passed through many
decades of a colossal and common experience, including the
experience of the collapse of the two Internationals, it is ab
solutely unthinkable to build new, Marxist, revolutionary par
ties, without direct contact with the same work in other countries.
And this means the building of the Fourth International.
To be sure, the ILP has in reserve a certain international
association, namely, the London Bureau (lAG). Is this the
beginning of a new International? Emphatically, no! The ILP
comes out against "split" more decisively than any other
participant: not for nothing has the bureau of those organizations
who themselves split a way inscribed on its banner . . . "unity."
Unity with whom? The ILP itself yearns exceedingly to see all
revolutionary socialist organizations and all sections of the
Communist International united in a single International, and
that this International have a good program. The road to hell is
paved with good intentions. The position of the ILP is all the
more helpless since nobody else shares it inside the London
Bureau itself. On the other hand, the Communist International,
having drawn social-patriotic conclusions from the theory of

socialism in one country, today seeks an alliance with powerful
reformist organizations, and not at all with weak revolutionary
groups. The April theses of the ILP console us: " . . . but they (i.e.,
the other organizations in the London Bureau) agree that the
question of a new International is now theoretical (!), and that the
form (!) which the reconstructed International will take will
depend upon historical events (!) and the development of the
actual working class struggle" (p. 20).
Remarkable reasoning! The ILP urges the unity of the
"revolutionary socialist organizations" with the sections of the
Communist International; but there is not and there cannot be
any desire on the part of either for this unification. "But," the
ILP consoles itself, the revolutionary socialist organizations are
agreed upon . . . what? Upon the fact that it is still impossible to
foresee today what "form" the reconstructed International will
take. For this reason, the very question of the International
("Workers of the World Unite!") is declared to be "theoretical."
With equal justification one might proclaim the question of
socialism to be theoretical, since it is unknown what form it will
take; besides, it is impossible to achieve the socialist revolution
by means of a "theoretical" International.
For the ILP, the question of a national party and the question
of the International rest on two different planes. The danger of
war and fascism demands, as we were told, immediate work for
the building of a national party. As regards the International,
this question is . . . "theoretical. " Opportunism reveals itself in
nothing else more clearly and incontestably than in this
principled counterposing of a national party to the International.
The banner of "revolutionary socialist unity" serves only as a
cover for the yawning gap in the policy of the ILP. Are we not
justified in saying that the London Bureau is a temporary haven
for vacillators, strays, and those who hope to be "invited" to one
of the existing Internationals?
While acknowledging that the Communist Party has a
"revolutionary and theoretical basis," the ILP discerns "sectar
ianism" in its conduct. This characterization is superficial, one
sided, and fundamentally false. Which "theoretical basis" has the
ILP in mind? Is it Marx's Capital, Lenin's Works, the resolutions
of the first congresses of the Comintern?-or the eclectic program
of the Communist International accepted in 1928, the wretched
theory of the "third period," "social fascism," and finally, the
latest social patriotic avowals?
The leaders of the ILP make believe (at any rate, such was the
case up to yesterday) that the Communist International has

preserved the theoretical basis that was established by Lenin. In
other words, they identify Leninism with Stalinism. To be sure,
they are unable to make up their minds to say it in so many
words. But in their passing silently over the enormous critical
struggle that took place first inside the Communist International
and then outside it; in their refusal to study the struggle waged
by the "Left Opposition" (the Bolshevik-Leninists) and to deter
mine their attitude toward it, the leaders of the ILP turn out to be
backward provincials in the sphere of the questions of the world
movement. In this they pay tribute to the worst traditions of the
insular working class movement.
As a matter of fact, the Communist International has no
theoretical basis. Indeed, what sort of theoretical basis can there
be, when yesterday's leaders, like Bukharin, are pronounced to be
"bourgeois liberals," when the leaders of the day before
yesterday, like Zinoviev, are incarcerated as "counterrevolution
ists," while the Manuilskys, Lozovskys, Dimitrovs, together with
Stalin himself, never generally bothered much with questions of
theory. l s:J
The remark in relation to "sectarianism" is no less erroneous.
Bureaucratic centrism, which seeks to dominate the working
class, is not sectarianism but a specific refraction of the
autocratic rule of the Soviet bureaucracy. Having burnt their
fingers, these gentlemen are abjectly crawling today before
reformism and patriotism. The leaders of the ILP took for gospel
the assertion of the leaders of the SAP (poor counselors!) that the
Com intern would be perfect, if not for its "ultraleft sectarianism."
In the meantime, the Seventh Congress has spurned the last
remnants of "ultraleftism"; but as a result, the Communist
International did not rise higher but fell still lower, losing all
right to an independent political existence. Because the parties of
the Second International are, in any case, more suitable for the
policy of blocs with the bourgeoisie and for the patriotic
corruption of workers: they have behind them an imposing
opportunist record, and they arouse less suspicion on the part of
bourgeois allies.
Aren't the leaders of the ILP of the opinion that after the
Seventh Congress they ought to radically reconsider their
attitude toward the Communist International? If it is impossible
to reform the Labour Party, then there are immeasurably fewer
chances for reforming the Communist International. Nothing
remains except to build the new International. True, in the ranks
of the Communist parties quite a few honest revolutionary
workers are still to be found. But they must be led out from the
quagmire of the Comintern onto the revolutionary road.
Both the revolutionary conquest of power and the dictatorship
of the proletariat are included in the program of the ILP. After
the events in Germany, Austria, and Spain, these slogans have
become compulsory. But this does not at all mean that in every
case they are invested with a genuine revolutionary content. The
Zyromskys of all countries find no embarrassment in combining
the "dictatorship of the proletariat" with the most debased
patriotism, and moreover, such fakery is becoming more and
more fashionable. The leaders of the ILP are not social patriots.
But until they blow up their bridges to Stalinism, their
internationalism will remain semi platonic in character.
The April theses of the ILP enable us to approach the same
question from a new standpoint. In the theses two special
paragraphs (27 and 28) are devoted to the future British councils
of workers' deputies. They contain nothing wrong. But it is
necessary to point out that the councils (soviets) as such are only
an organizational form and not at all a sort of immutable
principle. Marx and Engels provided us with the theory of the
proletarian revolution, partly in their analysis of the Paris
Commune, but they did not have a single word to say about the
councils. In Russia there were Social Revolutionary and Men
shevik soviets, i.e., antirevolutionary soviets. In Germany and
Austria in 1918, the councils were under the leadership of
reformists and patriots and they played a counterrevolutionary
role. In autumn 1923, in Germany, the role of the councils was
fulfilled actually by the shop committees that could have
guaranteed fully the victory of the revolution, if it had not been
for the craven policy of the Communist Party under the
leadership of Brandler and Company. 1 84 Thus, the slogan of
councils, as an organizational forni, is not in itself of a principled
character. We have no objection, of course, to the inclusion of
councils as "all-inclusive organizations" (p. 11) in the program of
the ILP. Only the slogan must not be turned into a fetish, or
worse yet-into a hollow phrase, as in the hands of the French
Stalinists ("Power to Daladier!"-"Soviets everywhere!").
But we are interested in another aspect of the question.
Paragraph 28 of the theses reads, "The workers' councils will
arise in their final form in the actual revolutionary crisis, but the
party must consistently prepare for their organization" (our
italics). Keeping this in mind, let us compare the attitude of the
ILP toward the future councils with its own attitude toward the
future International: the erroneousness o f the ILP's position will

then stand before us with the sharpest clarity. In relation to the
International we are given generalities in the spirit of the SAP:
"the form which the reconstructed International will take will
depend upon historic events and the actual development of the
working class struggle." On this ground the ILP draws the
conclusion that the question of the International is purely
"theoretical," i.e., in the language of empiricists, unreal. At the
same time we are told that "the workers' councils will arise in
their final form in the actual revolutionary crisis, but the party
must consistently prepare for their organization."
It is hard to become more hopelessly muddled. On the question
of the councils and on the question of the International, the ILP
resorts to methods of reasoning that are directly contradictory. In
which case is it mistaken? In both. The theses turn the actual
tasks of the party upside down. The councils represent an
organizational form, and only a form. There is no way of
"preparing for" councils except by means of a correct revolution
ary policy applied in all spheres of the working class movement:
there is no special, specific "preparation for" councils. It is
entirely otherwise with the International. While the councils can
arise only on the condition that there is a revolutionary ferment
among the many-millioned masses, the International is always
necessary: both on holidays and weekdays, during periods of
offensive as well as in retreat, in peace as well as in war. The
International is not at all a "form," as flows from the utterly false
formulation of the ILP. The International is first of all a
program, and a system of s trategic, tactical, and organizational
methods that flow from it. By dint of historic circumstances the
question of the British councils is deferred for an indeterminate
period of time. But the question of the International, as well as
the question of national parties, cannot be deferred for a single
hour: we have here in essence two sides of one and the same
question. Without a Marxist International, national organiza
tions, even the most advanced, are doomed to narrowness,
vacillation, and helplessness; the advanced workers are forced to
feed upon surrogates for internationalism. To proclaim the
building of the Fourth International as "purely theoretical," i.e.,
needless, is cravenly to renounce the basic task of our epoch. In
such a case, slogans of revolution, of the dictatorship of the
proletariat, councils, etc., lose nine-tenths of their meaning.
The August 30 issue of the New Leader carries an excellent
article: "Don't Trust the Government!" The article points out that
the danger of "national unity" draws closer with the approaching

danger of war. At a time when the ill-fated leaders of the SAP call
for the emulation-literally sol-of British pacifists, the New
Leader writes : "It (the government) is actually using the
enthusiasm for peace to prepare the British people for imperialist
war."
These lines, which are printed in italics, express with utmost
precision the political function of petty-bourgeois pacifism: by
providing a platonic outlet for the masses' horror of war, pacifism
enables imperialism all the more easily to transform these
masses into cannon fodder. The New Leader lashes the patriotic
position of Citrine and other social imperialists who (with
quotations from Stalin) mount upon the b acks of Lansbury and
other pacifists. I 85 But this same article goes on to express its
"astonishment" at the fact that the British Communists are
supporting Citrine's policy on the question of the League of
Nations and the "sanctions" against Italy ( "astonishing support
of Labour line"). l86
The "astonishment" in the article is the Achilles' heel of the
entire policy of the ILP. When an individual "astonishes" us by
his unexpected behavior, it only means that we are p oorly
acquainted with this individual's real character. It is immeasur
ably worse when a politician is compelled to confess his
"astonishment" at the acts of a political p arty and, what is more,
of an entire International. For the British Communists are only
carrying out the decisions of the Seventh Congress of the
Communist International. The leaders of the ILP are " aston
ished" only b ecause they have failed up to now to grasp the real
character of the Communist International and its sections. Yet,
there is a twelve-year history behind the Marxist criticism of the
Communist International. From the time the Soviet bureaucracy
made as its symbol of faith the theory of "socialism in one
country" (1924), the Bolshevik-Leninists forecasted the inevitabil
ity of the nationalist and patriotic degeneration of the sections of
the Communist International, and from then on they followed
this process critically through all its stages. The leaders of the
ILP were caught off guard by events only because they had
ignored the criticism by our tendency. The privilege of being
"astonished" by major events is the prerogative of a pacifist and
reformist petty bourgeois. Marxists, especially those claiming the
right to leadership, must be capable not of astonishment but of
foresight. And, we may remark in passing, it is not the first time
in history that Marxist doubt turned out more penetrating than
centrist credulity.
The ILP broke with the mighty Labour Party because of the
latter's reformism and patriotism. And today, retorting to
Wilkinson,1 87 the New Leader writes that the independence of the
ILP is fully justified by the patriotic position of the Labour Party.
Then what are we to say about the ILP's interminable flirtation
with the British Communist Party, which now tails behind the
Labour Party? What are we to say about the ILP's urge to fuse
with the Third International, which is now the first fiddle in
the socialpatriotic orchestra? Are you "astonished." Comrades
Maxton, Fenner Brockway, and others?188 That does not suffice
for a party leadership. In order to put an end to being astonished,
one must evaluate critically the road that has been traveled, and
draw a conclusion for the future.
Back in August 1933, the BolshevikLeninist delegation issued
a special declaration officially proposing to all the participants in
the London Bureau, among them the ILP, that they review jointly
with us the basic strategic problems of our epoch and, in
particular, that they determine their attitude to our programmatic
documents. But the leaders of the ILP deemed it below their
dignity to occupy themselves with such matters. Besides, they
were afraid they might compromise themselves by consorting
with an organization which is the target of a particularly rabid
and vile persecution at the hands of the Moscow bureaucracy: we
should not overlook the fact that the leaders of the ILP awaited
all the while an "invitation" from the Communist International.
They waited, but the awaited did not materialize. . . .
Is it conceivable that even after the Seventh Congress the
leaders of the ILP will be so hardy as to present the matter as if
the British Stalinists turned out to be the squires of the little
honored Sir Walter Citrine only through a misunderstanding,
and only for a split second? Such a dodge would be unworthy of a
revolutionary party. We should like to entertain the hope that the
leaders of the ILP will come at last to an understanding of how
lawful is the complete and irremediable collapse of the Commu
nist International as a revolutionary organization, and that they
will draw from this all the necessary conclusions. These are quite
simple:
Work out a Marxist program.
Turn away from the leaders of the Communist Party and face
toward . . . the mass organizations.
Stand under the banner of the Fourth International.
On this road we are ready to march shoulder to shoulder with
the ILP.
L. Trotsky
October 20, 1935

A Necessary Addition
In my article I approved of the attitude of this party on the
question of sanctions. Later, friends sent me a copy of an
important letter from Comrade Robertson to the members of the
ILP.18 Comrade Robertson accuses the leadership of the party of
maintaining pacifist illusions, particularly in the matter of
"refusal" of military service. I can only associate myself wholly
with what is said in Comrade Robertson's letter. The ILP's
misfortune is that it doesn't have a truly Marxist program. That
too is why its best activities, such as sanctions against British
imperialism, are always influenced by pacifist and centrist
mixtures.
L.T.
FOR PRACTICAL STEPS
TOWARD RAPPR O CHEMENT 190
October 1 1, 1935
Dear Comrade Vereecken:

I have received your two letters that speak of the need to work
together in the event of w ar. But politics in the event of war can
only be the continuation of politics during peacetime. I am quite
ready to do everything possible for a rapprochement, but your
two letters contain no concrete suggestions. You have found the
differences over entry to be important enough to separate yourself
from our tendency. You condemn our internal regime. At the
same tim e you call for the Fourth International. That is the
actual situation. The Fourth International will not be composed
only of Bolshevik-Leninists. For my part, I am completely for
accepting your admission. But you represent a different tendency
from ours with regard to politics and regime (and in addition,
your attitude is incomprehensible). What practical steps can you
suggest to me for a rapprochement that will be effective?
My best greetings,
L.D.T.
151
SECTARIANISM, CENTRISM,
AND THE F OURTH INTERNATIO NAL19 1
October 22 , 1935
It would be absurd to deny the presence of sectarian tendencies

in our midst. They have been laid bare by an entire series of
discussions and splits . Indeed, how could an element of
sectarianism have failed to m anifest itself in an ideological
m ovement which stands irreconcilably opposed to all the
dominant organizations in the working clas s , and which is
subj ected to monstrous, absolutely unprecedented persecutions all
over the world?
Reformists and centrists readily seize upon every occasion to
point a finger at our "sectarianism. " Most of the time they have
in mind not our weak but our strong side: our s erious attitude
toward theory; our effort to plumb every political situation to the
bottom , and to advance clear-cut slogans; our hostility to "easy"
and "comfortable" decisions, which deliver from cares today, but
prepare a catastrophe on the m orrow. Coming from opportunists ,
the accusation of sectarianism is most often a compliment.
Curiously enough, however, we are often accused of sectarian
ism not only by reformists and centrists but by opponents from
the "left," the notorious sectarians who might well be placed as
exhibits in any museum. The basis for their dissatisfaction with
us lies in our irreconcilability to themselves, in our striving to
purge ourselves of the infantile sectarian diseases and to rise to a
higher level.
To a superficial mind it may seem that such words as sectarian,
centrists , etc., are merely polemical expressions exchanged by
opponents for lack of other and m ore appropriate epithets . Yet the
concept of sectarianism, as well as the concept of centrism, has a
precise meaning in a Marxist diction ary. Marxism has built a
scientific program upon the laws that govern the movement of
capitalist society and were discovered by it. This is a colossal
conquest! However, it is not enough to create a correct program. It
152
Sectarianism, Centrism, and the FI 153
is necessary for the working class to accept it. But the sectarian,
in the nature of things , comes to a stop upon the first h alf of the
task. Active intervention into the actual struggle of the masses of
workers is supplanted for him by propagandistic abstractions of
a Marxist program .
Every working class party, every faction, during its initial
stages, passes through a period of pure propaganda, i . e . , the
training of its cadres. The period of existence as a Marxist circle
invariably grafts habits of an abstract approach onto the
problems of the workers' movement. Whoever is unable to step in
time over the confines of this circumscribed existence becomes
transformed into a conservative sectarian. The sectarian looks
upon the life of society as a great school, with himself as a
teacher there. In his opinion the working class should put aside
its less important matters , and assemble in solid rank around his
rostrum. Then the task would be solved.
Though he may swear by Marxism in every sentence, the
sectarian is the direct negation of dialectical materialism, which
takes experience as its point of departure and always returns to
it. A sectarian does not understand the dialectical action and
reaction between a finished program and a living-that is to s ay,
imperfect and unfinished-mass struggle. The sectarian ' s m eth
od of thinking is that of a rationalist, a formalist, and an
enlightener. D uring a certain stage of development rationalism is
progressive, being directed critically against blind beliefs and
superstitions (the eighteenth century! ) . The progressive stage of
rationalism is repeated in every great emancipatory movement.
But rationalism (abstract propagandism) becomes a reactionary
factor the moment it is directed against the dialectic. Sectarian
ism is hostile to dialectics (not in words but in action) in the s ense
that it turns its back upon the actual development of the working
class .
T h e sectarian lives in a sphere of ready-made formulas. As a
rule life passes him by without noticing him; but now and then he
receives in p assing such a fillip as makes him turn 180 degrees
around on his axis, and often m akes him continue on his straight
path , only . . . in the opposite direction. Discord with reality
engenders in the sectarian the need to constantly render his
formulas more precise . This goes under the name of discussion.
To a M arxist, discussion is an important but functional
instrument of the class struggle. To the sectarian, discussion is a
goal in itself. However, the more he discusses, the more the actual
tasks escape him . He is like a man who s atisfies his thirst with
salt water: the more he drinks, the thirstier he becomes. Hence

the constant irritability of the sectarian . Who slipped him the
salt? Surely, the "capitulators" from the International Secreta
riat. The sectarian sees an enemy in everyone who attempts to
explain to him that an active participation in the workers'
movement demands a constant study of obj ective conditions, and
not haughty bulldozing from the sectarian rostrum. For analysis
of reality the sectarian substitutes intrigue, gossip, and hysteria.
Centrism is in a certain sense the polar opposite of sectarian
ism; it abhors precise formulas, seeks routes to reality outside of
theory. But despite Stalin's famous formula, " antipodes" often
turn out to be . . . "twins."192 A formula detached from life is
hollow. Living reality cannot be grasped without theory. Thus
both of them, the sectarian and the centrist, depart in the end
with empty hands and j oin together . . . in their feeling of
animosity toward the genuine Marxist.
How many times have we met a smug centrist who reckons
himself a "realist" merely because he sets out to swim without
any ideological b aggage whatever and is tossed by every vagrant
current. He is unable to understand that principles are not dead
ballast but a life line for a revolutionary swimmer. The sectarian,
on the other h and, generally does not want to go swimming at all,
in order not to wet his principles. He sits on the shore and reads
lectures on morality to the flood of the class struggle . But
sometimes a desperate sectarian leaps headlong into the water,
seizes hold of the centrist and helps him drown. So it was; so it
will be.
In our epoch of disintegration and dispersion there are to b e

found a g o o d many circles in various countries that have
acquired a Marxist program, most often by borrowing it from the
Bolsheviks, and who then turned their ideological baggage into a
greater or lesser degree of ossification.
Let us take for example the best specimen of this type, namely
the Belgian group led by Comrade Vereecken. On August 10,
Spartacus, the organ of this group, announced its adherence to
the Fourth International. This announcement was to be wel
comed. But at the same time it is necessary to state beforehand
that the Fourth International would be doomed if it made
concessions to sectarian tendencies.
Vereecken was in his own time an irreconcilable opponent of
the entry of the French Communist League into the Socialist
Party. There is no crime in this: the question was a new one, the
Sectarianism, Cen trism, and the FI 155
step a risky one, and differences were entirely permissible. In a

certain sense, equally permissible , or at any rate unavoidable,
were exaggerations in the ideological struggle. Thus, Vereecken
predicted the inevitable ruin of the international organization of
the Bolshevik-Leninists as a result of its "dissolution" in the
Second International. We would advise Vereecken to reprint
today in Spartacus his prophetic documents of yesteryear. But
this is not the chief evil. Worse yet is the fact that in its present
declaration Spartacus confines itself to evasively pointing out
that the French section remained true to its principles "in a
considerable, we m ay even say a large, measure. " If Vereecken
behaved as a Marxist politician should, he would have stated
clearly and definitely wherein our French section departed from
its principles, and he would have given a direct and open answer
to the question of who proved to be right: the advocates or the
opponents of entry?
Vereecken is even more incorrect in his attitude toward our
Belgian section, which entered the reformist Labor Party [POB].
Instead of studying the experiences resulting from the work
carried on under new conditions, and criticizing the actual steps
taken, if they merit criticism, Vereecken keeps on complaining
about the conditions of the discussion in which he suffered defeat.
The discussion, you see, was incomplete, inadequate, and
disloyal: Vereecken failed to satisfy his thirst with salt water.
There is no "real" democratic centralism in the International
Communist League! In relation to the opponents of the entry, the
League evinced . . . "sectarianism. "
I t i s clear that C omrade Vereecken has a liberal and not a
Marxist conception of sectarianism: in this he obviously draws
close to the centrists. It is not true that the discussion was
inadequate; it was carried on for several months, orally and in
the press, and on an international scale, besides. After Vereecken
had failed to convince others that marking time in one place is
the best revolutionary policy, he refused to abide b y the decisions
of the national and international organizations. The representa
tives of the maj ority told Vereecken on more than one occasion
that if experience proved that the step taken was incorrect, w e
would rectify t h e mistake j ointly. Is i t really possible that after
the twelve-year struggle of the B olshevik-Leninists, you lack
sufficient confidence in your own organization to preserve
discipline of action even in case of tactical disagreements?
Vereecken paid no heed to comradely and conciliating argu
ments. After the entry of the maj o rity of the Belgian section into
the Labor Party, the Vereecken group naturally found itself

outside our ranks . The blame for this falls entirely upon its own
shoulders .
If we return to the gist of the question, then C omrade

Vereecken' s sectarianism stands out in all its dogmatic uncouth
ness. What's this! cried Vereecken in indignation: Lenin spoke of
breaking with reformists but the Belgian Bolshevik-Leninists
enter a reformist party! But Lenin had in mind a break with
reformists as the inevitable consequence of a struggle against
them, and not an act of s alvation regardless of time and place. He
required a split with the social patriots not in order to s ave his
own soul but in order to tear the masses away from social
patriotism. In Belgium the trade unions are fused with the
Belgian Labor Party; the Belgian party is essentially the
organized working class.
To be sure, the entry of revolutionists into the Belgian Labor
Party not only opened up possibilities but also imposed restric
tions . In propagandizing Marxist ideas it is necessary to take into
account not only the legalities of the b ourgeois state, but also the
legalities of a reformist party (both these legalities , it m ay be
added, coincide in large m easure) . Generally speaking, adapta
tion to an alien "legality" carries with it an indubitable danger.
But this did not prevent the Bolsheviks from utilizing even
czarist legality: for many years the Bolsheviks were compelled to
call themselves , at trade union meetings and in the legal press,
not Social Democrats, but "consistent democrats. " True, this did
not pass scot-free; a considerable number of elements adhered to
Bolshevism who were more or less consistent democrats , but not
at all international socialists; however, by supplementing legal
with illegal activity, Bolshevism overcame the difficulties.
Of course, the "legality" of Vandervelde, de Man, Spaak, and
other flunkeys of the Belgian plutocracy imposes very onerous
restrictions upon the Marxists , and thus engenders dangers.But
Marxists who are not as yet sufficiently strong to create their
own party have their o w n methods for the struggle against the
dangers of reformist captivity: a clear-cut program, constant
factional ties, international criticism, etc. The activity of a
revolutionary wing in a reformist party can be j udged correctly
only by evaluating the dynamics of development. Vereecken does
not do this in regard to either the A SR faction, or the Verite
group. Had he done s o , he would have b een compelled to admit
that the ASR has made s erious advances in the recent period.
What the final balance will be is impossible to forecast as yet. But
the entry into the Belgian Labor Party is already justified by

experience.
Extending and generalizing his mistake, Vereecken asserts
that the existence of isolated small groups that split away at
different stages from o ur international organization is proof of
our sectarian methods. Thus, the actual relationships are stood
on their head.As a m atter of fact, into the ranks of the Bolshevik
Leninists during the initial stages came a considerable number of
anarchistic and individualistic elements generally incapable of
organizational discipline, and occasionally an incompetent, who
could not make his c areer in the Comintern. These elements
viewed the struggle against "bureaucratism" in approximately
the following manner: no decisions must ever be arrived at;
instead, "discussion" is to be installed as a permanent occupa
tion. We can say with complete justification that the Bolshevik
Leninists showed a good deal of p atience-perhaps even a good
deal too much-toward such types of individuals and grouplets.
Only since an international core h a s been consolidated, and has
begun to assist the n ational sections in purging their ranks of
internal sabotage, has actual and systematic growth of our
international organization begun.
Let us take a few examples of groups that split from our

international organization at various stages of its development.
The French periodical Que faire? [What Is To Be Done?] is an
instructive specimen of a combination of sectarianism with
eclecticism.193 On the most important questions this periodical
expounds the views of the Bolshevik-Leninists, changing a few
commas and directing severe critical remarks at us.At the same
time, this periodical permits a defense of social-patriotic garbage,
under the guise of discussion, and under the cover of " defending
the USSR," to go on with impunity. The internationalists of Que
faire? are themselves unable to explain how and why they
happen to cohabit peacefully with social patriots, after breaking
with the Bolsheviks. It is clear, however, that with such
eclecticism Que faire? is least capable of replying to the question
what to do (que faire).
The "internationalists" and the social patriots are agreed on
only one thing: never the Fourth International! Why? One must
not " break away" from the Communist workers. We have heard
the s ame argument from the SAP: we must not break away from
the Social Democratic workers. In this instance too, antipodes
turn out to be twins. The peculiar thing, however, is that Que
158 Writings of Leon Trotsky (193536)
faire? is not connected and, by its very nature, cannot be

connected with any workers.
There is even less to be said about such groups as Internation
ale or Proletaire.l94 They also abstract their views from the latest
issues of La Verite, with an admixture of critical improvisations.
They have no perspectives at all of revolutionary growth; but
they m anage to get along without perspectives. Instead of trying
to learn within the framework of a more serious organization (to
learn is difficult), these haters of discipline, very pretentious
"leaders," desire to teach the working class (this appears to them
to be easier). In moments of sober reflection they must themselves
realize that their very existence as "independent" organizations
is a sheer misunderstanding.
In the United States we might mention the Field and Weisbord
groupS. 195 Field-in his entire political makeup-is a bourgeois
radical who has acquired the economic views of Marxism. To
become a revolutionist Field would h ave had to work for a
number of years as a disciplined soldier in a revolutionary
proletarian organization; but he began by deciding to create a
workers' movement "of his own." Assuming a position to our
"left" (where else?), Field'shortly entered into fraternal relations
with the SAP. As we see, the incident that befell Bauer was not at
all accidental. The urge to stand to the left of Marxism leads
fatally into the centrist swamp.
Weisbord is indubitably closer to a revolutionary type than
Field. But at the same time he represents the purest example of a
sectarian. He is utterly incapable of preserving proportions,
either in ideas or in actions. Every principle he turns into a
sectarian caricature. That is why even correct ideas in his hands
become instruments for disorganizing his own ranks.
There is no need to dwell upon similar groups in other
countrie s. They split from us not because we are intolerant or
intolerable but because they themselves did not and could not go
forward. Since the time of the split they have succeeded only in
exposing their incapacity. Their attempts to unite with each
other, on a national or an internation al scale, produced no results
in any single case: peculiar to sectarianism is only the power of
repulsion and not the power of attraction.
Some crank has computed the number of "splits" we have had
and arrived at the sum of about a score. He s aw in this
devastating evidence of our bad regime. The peculiar thing is that
in the SAP itself, which had triumphantly published these
computations, there occurred during the few years of its existence
more rifts and splits than in all our sections taken together.
Taken by itself, however, this fact is meaningless.It is necessary
to take not the bald statistics of splits but the dialectics of
development. After all its splits , the SAP remained an extremely
heterogeneous organization which will be unable to withstand
the first onslaught of great events.This applies even to a larger
measure to the "London Bureau of Revolutionary Socialist
Unity , " which is being torn asunder by irreconcilable contradic
tions: its tomorrow will consist not of "unity" but only of splits.
In the meantime, the organization of the Bolshevik-Leninists ,
after purging itself of sectarian and centrist tendencies, not only
grew numerically, not only strengthened its international ties,
but also found the road to fusion with organizations akin to it in
spirit (Holland, United States). The attempts to blow up the
Dutch party (from the right, through Molenar!) 1 96 and the
American party (from the left, through Bauer!) h ave only led to
the internal cons olidation of both these parties. We can predict
with assurance that parallel to the disintegration of the London
Bureau will proceed an ever more rapid growth of the organiza
tions of the Fourth International.
How the new International will take form, through what stages
it will pass, what final shape it will assume-this no one can
foretell today. And indeed there is no need to do so: historical
events will show us. But it is necessary to begin by proclaiming a
p rogram that meets the tasks of our epoch. On the basis of this
program it is necessary to mobilize cothinkers, the pioneers of the
new International. No other road is possible.
The Communist Manifesto of Marx and Engel s , directly aimed
against all types of utopian-sectarian socialism, forcefully points
out that Communists do not oppose themselves to the actual
workers' movements but participate in them as a vanguard. At
the same time the Manifesto was the program of a new party,
national and international. The sectarian is content with a
program, as a recipe for salvation.The centrist guides himself by
the famous (essentially meaningless) formula of Edward Bern
stein: "the movement is everything; the final goal-nothing." 1 97
The Marxist draws his scientific program from the movement
taken as a whole, in order then to apply this program to every
concrete stage of the movement.
On the one hand, the initial steps of the new International are
rendered more difficult by the old organizations and splinters
from them; on the other hand, they are facilitated by the colossal
experience of the past. The process of crystallization, which is
very difficult and full of torments during the first stages , will
assume in the future an impetuous and rapid character. The
recent international events are of incommensurate significance
for the formation of the revolutionary vanguard. In his own
fashion, Mussolini-and this should be recognized-has " aided"
the cause of the Fourth International. Great conflicts sweep away
all that is halfway and artificial and, on the other hand, give
strength to all that is viable. War leaves room only for two
tendencies in the ranks of the working class movement: social
patriotism, which does not stop at any b etrayal, and revolution
ary internationalism, which is bold and capable of going to the
end. It is precisely for this reason that centrists, fearful of
impending events , are waging a rabid struggle against the
Fourth International. They are correct in their own fashion: in
the wake of great convulsions , the only organizations that will be
able to survive and develop are those that have not only cleansed
their ranks of sectarianism but have also systematically trained
them in the spirit of despising all ideological vacillation and
cowardice.
ROMAIN ROLLAND
EXECUT E S AN A S S IGNMENT 1 98
October 3 1 , 1935
L'Humanite of October 23 prints a letter by Romain Rolland

which is intended to refute criticisms of the Soviet Union made
by a Swiss preacher. We would not have had the slightest reasons
for intervenin g in an argument b etween an apologist of
Gandhism199 and a Protestant pacifist, were it not for the fact
that Mr. Rolland himself, in passing, touches-in a very improper
manner-upon a number of burning questions, both p ersonal and
public in character. We cannot and do not demand from Mr.
Rolland either a Marxist analysis, political clarity, or revolution
ary insight; but one should imagine we would be j ustified in
expecting from him some psychological insight. Unfortunately,
as we shall shortly see, not a trace has been left of that.
To j ustify the terror which is directed by Stalin primarily
against his own party, R. Rolland writes that Kirov was
murdered "by a fanatic, who was secretly supported by such
people as Kamenev and Zinoviev. " Upon what grounds does
Rolland make so s erious a charge? Those who buzzed it to
Rolland were simply lying. It is precisely upon this question, in
which p olitics cuts across psychology, that Romain Rolland
should have had no difficulty in judging, if he were not blinded
by an excess of zeal.
The author of these lines has not the slightest reaso n to assume
upon himself responsibility for the activity of Zinoviev and
Kamenev, which was of no small aid to the bureaucratic
degeneration of the party and the soviets. However, it is
unthinkable to ascribe to them participation in a crime which is
without any political meaning and which at the same time
conflicts with the views and aims and the entire political past of
Kamenev and Zinoviev.
Even if they had suddenly turned partisans of individual
terror-such a hypothesis is fantastic!-they could never have
chosen Kirov as a victim. Anyone acquainted with the history of
161
the party and its p ersonnel is only too well aware that Kirov was
a third-rate bureaucratic figure in comparison with Kamenev and
Zinoviev: his elimination could have had no effect whatever upon
either the regime or its policies. Even during the trial of Zinoviev
and Kamenev (one of the most shameless of trials!) the original
version of the indictment was not sustained. Beyond an excess of
zeal, what right has Mr. Rolland to speak about the participation
of Kamenev and Zinoviev in the assassination of Kirov?
Let us remember that it was the intention of the initiators to
extend the accusation to the author of these lines as well. There
are many who probably still recall the role played by the
"Latvian consul," an agent provocateur of the GPU who
attempted to obtain a l etter from the terrorists "for transmission
to Trotsky." One of the hirelings of l'Humanite (I think his name
is Duclos) even wrote in the heat of the moment that Trotsky's
participation in the assassination of Kirov "was proved." I have
dealt with all the circumstances relating to this case in my
pamphlet The Kirov Assassination. Why didn't Romain Rolland
venture to repeat this p art of the coarse and brazen Thermidor
ean amalgam? Only because I had the opportunity to make a
timely exposure of the provocation and its direct organizers,
Stalin and Yagoda.20o Kamenev and Zinoviev cannot avail
themselves of such an opportunity: they are lodged in jail on the
basis of a premeditated false charge. It is possible to slander
them with impunity. Is this role becoming to Rolland?
On the pretext that they were implicated in the Kirov case, the
bureaucracy took the lives of scores of people who were devoted
heart and soul to the revolution, but disapproved of the self
indulgence and privileges of the ruling caste. Perhaps Mr.
Rolland will venture to deny this? We propose that an interna
tional commission, unimpeachable in its composition, be estab
lished to examine the arrests, trials, executions, exiles, and so on,
in connection with, say, the single Kirov case. Again it should be
recalled that when we tried the Social Revolutionaries in 1922, for
the commission of terrorist acts, we permitted Vandervelde, Kurt
Rosenfeld,20 1 and other outstanding opponents of Bolshevism to
attend the trial. Yet at that time, the position of the revolution
was immeasurably more difficult. Will Mr. Rolland accept our
proposal this time? It is doubtful, because this proposal will not
be-and cannot be-accepted by Stalin.
The measures of terror which were applied during the initial,
and, so to speak, "Jacobin," period of the revolution were called
for by the iron necessity of self-defense. We were in a position to
Romain Rolland Executes an Assignment 163
give an open accounting of these m easures to the entire

international working class. The terror of the present Thermidor
ean p erio d serves for the defense of the bureaucracy not so much
against the class enemies as against the advanced elements of
the proletariat itself. Thus, Romain Rolland steps forward as an
advocate of Thermidorean terror.
Only recently, the Soviet newspapers loudly proclaimed the
discovery of a new plot in which "Trotskyists" combined with
White Guards and criminal elements for the purpose of . . .
wrecking Soviet railroads.202 Not a single serious-minded person
in the Soviet Union will believe this new shameless fraud, which
throws devastating light upon a number of previous amalgams.
However, this will not deter the Stalinist clique from shooting
several young Bolsheviks guilty of lese majeste. And what will
Mr. Rolland do? Will he perhaps devote himself to the task of
convincing incredulous preachers that "Trotskyists" really do
wreck Soviet railroads?
In the sphere of general questions of p olitics, Mr. Rolland makes
assertions which are no less categorical and h ardly more
irreproachable. For the sake of defending the present policy of the
Soviets and of the Communist International, R. Rolland, in
accordance with the ancient ritual, hies himself b ack to the
experience of Brest-Litovsk. 203 We are all attention! He writes the
following, " In the year 1918, in Brest-Litovsk, Trotsky said to
Lenin: 'We must die like knights of old.' Lenin replied: 'We are not
knights. We want to live, and we intend to remain alive. ' '' Where
did Mr. Rolland get this piece of news? As a matter of fact, Lenin
was never in Brest-Litovsk. Did the conversation perhaps take
place over a direct wire? But all the documents relating to this
period have been printed, and obviously they do not contain
this-to put it bluntly-asinine statement, which one of Rolland's
informers buzzed into his ear for wider distribution. Still, how is
it that an old hand at writing did not h ave sufficent psychologi
cal intuition to understand the caricatured falseness of the
dialogue he reproduced?
It would be out of place to enter here into a belated controversy
with Rolland over the Brest-Litovsk negotiations. But since
Rolland trusts in Stalin almost as much as he formerly trusted in
Gandhi, we will take the liberty of referring to a statement Stalin
made on February 1, 1918, i.e. , during the final hours of the Brest
Litovsk decisions: "A way out of the difficult situation was given
us by an intermediate p oint of view-the position of Trotsky." I
am not referring to my own recollections, or to conversations with
interlocutors , no matter how highly placed, but to the official

protocols of the sessions of the Central Executive Committee
issued by the Government Printing Office in 1929. The above
quotation (page 214) will probably seem to Rolland utterly
unexpected. But it ought to convince him of how careless it is for
anyone to write on subjects he knows nothing about.
Mr. Rolland lectures us-me, in particular-that the Soviet
government can conclude agreements, if need be, even with the
imperialists. Was s uch a revelation worth a trip to Moscow? The
French workers are forced every day to enter into agreements
with the capitalists, so long as the latter continue to exist. A
workers' state cannot renounce the right which every trade union
has . But should a trade union leader, upon signing a collective
agreement, announce publicly that he recognizes and approves
capitalist property, we would call s uch a leader a traitor. Stalin
did not merely conclude a practical agreement, but on top and
independent of that he approved the growth of French militarism.
Every class-conscious worker knows that the French army exists
primarily to ,safeguard the property of a handful of exploiters,
and to support the rule of bourgeois France over sixty million
colonial slaves.
Because of the just indignation aroused in the workers' ranks
by Stalin's declaration, attempts are being made today, among
them the one through Rolland, to explain that "practically"
everything remains just as before. But for our part, we do not put
an iota of trust in them. The voluntary and demonstrative
approval of French militarism by Stalin, one should imagine, was
not intended to enlighten the French b ourgeoisie, who did not at
all require any urging, and who met it quite ironically. Stalin' s
declaration could have h a d only a single purpose: by weakening
the opposition of the French proletariat to its own imperialism to
buy at this price the confidence of the French bourgeoisie in the
stability of an alliance with Moscow . This policy, despite all
qualifications, is being vigorously followed right now. The
shrieks of l'Humanite against Laval do not alter in any way the
fact that the Comintern has become the political agency of the
League of Nations, in which this very s ame Laval rules the roost,
or his cousin Herriot, or his British partner Baldwin,204 who is no
better than Laval.
With very little authority, Romain Rolland decrees that the new
policy of the Communist International remains in strict harmony
with the teachings of Lenin. In that case, the solidarity of the
French Communist Party with the foreign policy of Leon Blum
Romain Rolland Executes an Assignment 165
the ("social fascist" of yesterday, who, at any rate, remained true

to himself); the belly-crawling before Edouard Herriot (who has
not the slightest inclination to turn traitor to French capital); the
support of the League of Nations (this general staff of imperialist
intrigues) by the C ommunist parties; does all this flow from the
teachings of Lenin? No. Mr. Rolland had better return to his
studies of the teachings of Gandhi.
Unfortunately, Marcel Martinet's very clever, restrained, and
apt warning left no impression upon Rolland.205 Instead of
stopping and critically looking around, he slid all the way down
into the ranks of the official apologists of the Thermidorean
bureaucracy. In vain do these gentlemen deem themselves the
"friends" of the October Revolution. The bureaucracy is one
thing; the revolution is quite another. People's Commissar
Litvinov is a "friend of mine" even to the conservative bourgeois
Herriot. But it does not follow from this that the proletarian
revolution must consider Herriot as one of its friends.
It is impossible to prepare the coming day of the revolution
otherwise than by an irreconcilable struggle against the regime
of bureaucratic absolutism which has become the worst brake
upon the revolutionary movem ent. The responsibility for the
terroristic moods of the Soviet youth falls entirely upon the
bureaucracy, which has clamped a leaden lid upon the vanguard
of the working class, and which demands of the youth only blind
o bedience and glorification of the leaders.
The bureaucracy has concentrated colossal resources in its
hands, of which it gives an accounting to nobody. These
uncontrolled resources provide it in particular with an opportuni
ty to entertain and shower gifts royally upon any of its useful
"friends." Many of them are hardly to be distinguished in their
psychological m akeup from those French academicians and
journalists who are the professional friends of Mussolini. We
have no inclination to include Romain Rolland in this category.
But why does he himself so carelessly erase the line of
demarcation? Why does he undertake commissions which do not
become him?
LE S SONS O F OCTOBER2 0 6
November 4, 1935
I accept with the greatest readiness Fred Zeller's suggestion to

contribute an article to Revolution on the occasion of the
eighteenth anniversary of the October overturn. True, Revolution
is not a "big" daily newspaper ; it is j ust striving to become a
weekly. High-placed bureaucrats might pull contemptuous faces
on this score. But I have had occasion to observe many times how
"powerful" organizations with a "powerful" press crumbled to
dust under the impact of events, and how, on the other hand,
small organizations with a technically weak press were in a short
time transformed into historic forces. Let us firmly hope that
precisely this fate is in store for your paper and for your
organization.
In the year 1917, Russia was passing through the greatest
social crisis. One can say with certainty, however, on the b asis of
all the lessons of history, that had there been no Bolshevik Party
the immeasurable revolutionary energy of the masses would have
been fruitlessly spent in sporadic explosions, and the great
upheavals would have ended in the severest counterrevolutionary
dictatorship. The class struggle is the prime mover of history. It
needs a correct program, a firm party, a trustworthy and
courageous leadership-not heroes of the drawing room and of
parliamentary phrases , but revolutionists, ready to go to the very
end. This is the maj or lesson of the October Revolution.
We must remember, however, that at the beginning of 1917 the
Bolshevik Party led only an insignificant number of the toilers.
Not only in the soldiers ' soviets but also in the workers' s oviets,
the Bolshevik fraction generally constituted 1 to 2 percent, at best
5 percent. The leading p arties of petty-bourgeois democracy
(Mensheviks and the so-called Social Revolutionaries) had the
following of at least 95 percent of the workers, soldiers, and
peasants participating in the struggle. 207 The leaders of these
parties called the Bolsheviks first sectarians and then . . . agents
of the German kaiser. But no, the Bolsheviks were not sectarians!
166
Lessons of Octo ber 167
All their attention was directed to the masses, and moreover not
to their top layer, but to the deepest, most oppressed millions and
tens of millions , whom the p arliamentarian b abblers usually
forgot. Precisely in order to lead the proletarians and the
semiproletarians of city and countryside, the Bolsheviks consid
ered it necessary to distinguish themselves sharply from all
factions and groupings of the bourgeoisie, beginning with those
false "Socialists" who are in reality agents of the bourgeoisie.
Pa triotism is the principal p art of that ideology by means of
which the bourgeoisie poisons the class consciousness of the
oppressed and paralyzes their revolutionary will, because
patriotism means the subj ection of the proletariat to the "nation,"
astride which sits the bourgeoisie. The Mensheviks and Social
Revolutionaries were patriots: up until the February overturn,
half concealed; after February, openly and brazenly. They said:
"Now we have a republic, the freest republic in the world; even
our soldiers are organized into s oviets ; we must defend this
republic against German militarism . " The Bolsheviks replied:
"No question but that the Russian republic is now the most
democratic one; but this superficial political democracy may even
tomorrow crumble into dust since it rests on a capitalist
foundation. So long as the toiling people, under the leadership of
the proletariat, do not expropriate their own landowners and
capitalists and do not tear up the robber treaties with the
Entente, we cannot consider Russia our fatherland and cannot
take its defense upon ourselves." Our adversaries grew indignant.
"If s o , you are not simply sectarians, you are agents of the
Hohenzollerns! You b etray to them the Russian, French, English,
and American democracies ! " But the power of Bolshevism lay in
its ability to scorn the sophistries of cowardly "democrats" who
called themselves Socialists but who, in reality, kneeled before
capitalist property.
The j udges in the dispute were the toiling masses; as time went
on their verdict leaned more and more in favor of the Bolsheviks.
And no wonder. At the time the s oviets rallied around themselves
all the proletarian, soldier, and peasant masses who became
awakened for the struggle and on whom the fate of the country
depended. The "united front" of the Mensheviks and Social
Revolutionaries dominated the soviets and actually had power in
its hands. The bourgeoisie was completely paralyzed politically
since ten million soldiers , exhausted by the war, stood fully
armed on the side of the workers and peasants. But what the
leaders of the "united front" dreaded most of all was to "scare
off' the bourgeoisie, to "push" it to the camp of reaction_ The

united front dared not touch either the imperialist war, or the
banks, or feudal land ownership, or the shops and plants_ It
marked time and spouted general phrases while the masses lost
patience. More than that: the Mensheviks and Social Revolution
aries directly transferred the power to the C adet party, rej ected by
the toilers and despised by them.208
The Cadets represented an imperialist bourgeois p arty, b asing
itself on the top layers of the "middle classes" but remaining true
to the interests of "liberal" property owners on all fundamental
questions. The Cadets can, if you please, be compared with the
French Radicals: the same social base, that is, the "middle
classes"; the same lulling of the people to sleep with empty
phrases; and the same loyal service to the interests of imperial
ism. Just as with the Radicals, the Cadets had their left and their
right wing: the left-to befuddle the people; the right-to make
"serious " politics_ The Mensheviks and Social Revolutionaries
hoped to get.the support of the middle classes by an alliance with
the Cadets, that is, with the exploiters and defrauders of the
middle classes. By this the social patriots signed their own death
warrant.
Binding themselves voluntarily to the chariot of the bourgeoi
sie, the leaders of the Mensheviks and Social Revolutionaries
were trying to persuade the toilers to leave the expropriation of
the property owners to the future, and in the meantime . . . to die
on the front for " democracy " ; that is, for the interests of this
same bourgeoisie. "We must not push the Cadets into the camp of
the reaction," the opportunists repeated, parrot-like, at countless
meetings. But the masses could not and did not want to
understand them . They gave all their trust to the united front of
the Mensheviks and the Social Revolutionaries and were ready to
defend it at all times arms in hand against the bourgeoisie. But
meanwhile, having obtained the trust of the people, the p arties of
the united front called the bourgeois party to power and hid
behind it. The aroused revolutionary masses never forgive
cowardice and betrayal. Firs t the Petersburg workers, and after
them , the proletariat of the whole country; after the proletariat,
the soldiers; and after the soldiers, the peasants, became
convinced through experience that the Bolsheviks were right.
Thus, within but a few months the handful of "sectarians,"
"adventurers," "conspirators," " agents of Hohenzollern , " etc . ,
etc., transformed themselves into the leading party of millions of
awakened people. Loyalty to the revolutionary program, irrecon-
Lessons of Octo ber 169
cilable hostility to the bourgeoisie, decisive rupture with social

patrio ts, deep trust in the revolutionary force of the masses
these are the chief lessons of October.
The entire press, including the papers of the Mensheviks and
Social Revolutionaries* carried on a vicious campaign, really
unheard of in history, against the Bolsheviks. Thousands upon
thousands of tons of newsprint were filled with reports that the
Bolsheviks were linked to the czarist police, that they received
carloads of gold from Germany, that Lenin was hiding in a
German airplane, etc . , etc. In the first months after February this
torrent of abuse overcame the masses. Sailors and soldiers
threatened more than once to bayonet Lenin and other leaders of
Bolshevism. In July 1917 the slander campaign reached its
highest peak. Many sympathizing lefts and semilefts, especially
from among the intellectuals, became frightened by the pressure
of bourgeois public opinion . They said: "Certainly the Bolsheviks
are not agents of Hohenzollern but they are sectarians, they are
tactless, they provoke the democratic parties; it is impossible to
work with them. " This, for instance, was the tone pervading the
big daily of Maxim Gorky, 209 around which gathered all sorts of
centrists, semi-Bolsheviks, s emi-Mensheviks, theoretically very
left, but terribly afraid of a break with the Mensheviks and the
Social Revolutionaries. But it is a law that whoever is afraid of a
break with the social patriots will inevitably become their agent.
Meanwhile a directly opposite process was taking place among
the masses . The more disillusioned they became with the social
patriots, who betrayed the interests of the people for the sake of
friendship with the Cadets, the more attentively they listened to
the speeches of the Bolsheviks, and the more convinced they
became of their correctness. To the worker in the shop, the soldier
in the trench, the starving peasant, it became clear that the
capitalists and their lackeys were slandering the Bolsheviks
precisely because the Bolsheviks were firmly devoted to the
intere:;ts of the oppressed. Yesterday's indignation of the soldier
and sailor against the Bolsheviks became remolded into passion
ate devotion to them and unselfish readiness to follow them to the
very end. And, on the other hand, the hatred of the masses for the
Cadet party was inevitably transferred to its allies, the Menshe
viks and Social Revolutionaries. The social patriots did not save
*To avoid misunderstanding, let us point out that this anti-Marxist

party had nothing in common with revolutionary s ocialism.
the Cadets, but themselves perished. The final break in the mood
of the masses, which took place within two or three months
(August-September), made the October victory possible. The
Bolsheviks took over the soviets and the soviets took power.
Messrs. Skeptics might say: but in the end the October

Revolution brought the triumph of bureaucracy. Was it worth
making?
A separate article or perhaps two should be devoted to this
question. Here let us say briefly: history goes forward not along a
straight line but along a devious one; after a gigantic j ump
forward there follows, as after an artillery shot, a rebound.
Nevertheless history goes forward. No doubt, Soviet bureaucra
tism is an ugly ulcer, threatening both the conquests of the
October Revolution and the world proletariat. But the USSR
possesses something besides bureaucratic absolutism: national
ized means of production, planned economy, collectivization of
agriculture, which, despite the monstrous harm of bureaucratism,
lead the country forward economically and culturally while the
capitalist countries are moving backwards . The October Revolu
tion can be freed from the vise of bureaucratism only by the
development of the international revolution, the victory of which
will really assure the building of a socialist society.
Finally-and this is not insignificant-the October Revolution
is important also because it gave the international working class
a number of priceless lessons . Let the proletarian revolutionists of
France firmly learn these lessons and they will become invinci
ble.
HOW DID STALIN
D E FEAT THE OPP O SITION? 2 1 0
November 12, 1935
The questions posed by Comrade Zeller's letter are of interest

not only for history but also for the present time. It is not unusual
to meet them as often in political literature as in private
conversation, although in different forms, mostly personal ones.
"How and why did you lose power?" "How did Stalin lay his
hands on the apparatus?" "What makes for Stalin's strength?"
The question of the internal laws of revolution and counterrevo
lution is posed everywhere and always in a purely individual
way, as if the matter concerned a game of chess or some sporting
contest and not profound conflicts and changes with a social
character. In this context m any pseudo-Marxists are in n o way
distinguished from vulgar democrats who use the criteria of
parliamentary lobbies when faced with great popular movements.
Whoever understands history even slightly knows that every
revolution has provoked a subsequent counterrevolution which , to
be sure, has never completely thrown the nation all the way b ack
to its starting point in the sphere of the economy but has always
taken from the people a considerable part, sometimes the lion's
share, of its political conquests . And the first victim of the
reactionary wave as a general rule is that l ayer of revolutionaries
which stood at the head of the masses in the first period of the
revolution, the period of the offensive, the "heroic" period. This
general historical observation should lead us to the idea that the
matter is not simply one of the skill, the cunning, or the art of two
or a few individuals, but of incomparably more profound causes.
Marxists, unlike superficial fatalists (of the type of Leon Blum,
Paul Faure , etc.), do not deny the role of the individual , his
initiative, his audacity, in the social struggle. But unlike the
idealists, M arxists know that consciousness is, in the last
analysi s , determined by b eing. The role of the leadership in the
revolution is enormous . Wi thout a correct leadership, the
171
proletariat cannot conquer. But even the best leadership cannot

foment revolution when it does not have the obj ective conditions.
Among the greatest merits of a proletarian leadership must be
reckoned the capacity to distinguish the moment when one can
attack and when it is necessary to withdraw. It was this capacity
which constituted the main strength of Lenin . *
The success or failure o f the Left Opposition's struggle against
the bureaucracy, to some degree or other, naturally, depended on
the qualities of the leaders in the two warring camps. But before
speaking of these qualities , we should clearly understand the
characters of the warring camps themselves , for the best leader of
one camp could be absolutely worthless for the other, and vice
versa. The question-it is very current (and very naive)-"Why
did Trotsky at the time not use the military apparatus against
Stalin?" is the clearest evidence in the world that the questioner
cannot or does not wish to reflect on the general historical
reasons for the victory of the Soviet bureaucracy over the
revolutionary vanguard of the proletariat. I have written about
these reasons more than once in a certain number of books,
beginning with my autobiography. I propose to sum up the most
important conclusions in a few lines .
It is not the present bureaucracy which ensured the victory of
the October Revolution, but the working and peasant masses
under Bolshevik leadership. The bureaucracy began to grow only
after the definitive victory, swelling its ranks not only with
revolutionary workers but also with representatives of other
classes (former czarist functionaries , officers , bourgeois intellectu
als, etc.). The present bureaucracy, in it overwhelming maj ority,
was , at the time of the October Revolution , in the bourgeois camp
(take as examples merely the Soviet ambassadors Potemkin,
Maisky, Troyanovsky, Surits , Khinchuk, etc . ) . 2 1 1 Those o f the
present bureaucracy who in the October days were in the
Bolshevik camp in the great majority of cases played no role even
slightly important in either the preparation or the conduct of the
*The Stalinists do exactly the opposite: when there was an economic

revival and relative political equilibrium, they proclaimed "The conquest
of the street," "Barricades," "Soviets everywhere" (the "third period");
and now, when France is going through a deep social and political crisis,
they throw themselves around the necks of the Radicals, that is, of a
bourgeois party that is absolutely rotted away. A long time ago it was
s aid that these gentlemen are in the habit of singing funeral psalms at
weddings and wedding hymns at funerals.
How Did Stalin Defeat the Oppositio n ? 173
revolution, or in the first years following it. This applies above all
to Stalin himself. As for the present young bureaucrats, they are
chosen and educated by the older ones, most often from among
their own children. And it is Stalin who has become the " chief' of
this new caste which has grown up after the revolution.
The history of the trade union movement in every country is
not only the history of strikes and in general of mass movements;
it is also the history of the formation of the trade union
bureaucracy. It is sufficiently well known what enormous
conservative power this bureaucracy has been able to acquire,
and with what infallible sense it chooses its "genial" l eaders and
forms them according to its needs: Gompers, Green , Legien,
Leip art, Citrine, etc . * 2 1 2 If Jouhaux has succeeded until now in
maintaining his positions against attacks from the left, it is not
because he is a great strategist-though, no doubt, he is superior
to his bureaucratic colleagues (it is not for nothing that he fills
the first place among them)-but because there is not a day, not
an hour, when his entire apparatus does not struggle obstinately
for its existence, does not s elect collectively the best methods for
that struggle, does not think for Jouhaux, and does not inspire
him with the necessary decisions. But that in no way means that
Jouhaux is invincible. Given a sudden change in the situation
toward revolution or toward fascism-the whole trade union
apparatus will lose its self-confidence, its skillful maneuvers will
show themselves to be without power, and Jouhaux himself will
produce an impression, not remarkable but miserable. We need
only recall what despicable nonentities the powerful and
arrogant chiefs of the German trade unions showed themselves to
be in 1918, when the revolution broke out against their will, as
well as in 1932, when Hitler was advancing.
These examples show the sources of the strength and the
weakness of the bureaucracy. It emerges from the movement of
the masses in the first period, the heroic period. But having risen
above the masses, and then having resolved its own " social
question" (an assured existence, influence, respect, etc . ) , the
bureaucracy tends increasingly to keep the masses immobile.
Why take risks? It has something to lose. The supreme expansion
* Only a pure lackey could speak of Stalin as a Marxist "theoretician. "

His book Pro blems of Leninism is an eclectic compilation, full of
schoolboy errors. But the n ational bureaucracy has conquered the
Marxist opposition by its social weight, not at all by "theory. "
of the influence and well-being of the reformist bureaucracy takes

place in an epoch of capitalist progress and of relative passivity
of the working masses. But when this passivity is broken, on the
right or on the left, the magnificence of the bureaucracy comes to
an end. Its intelligence and skill are transformed into stupidity
and impotence. The nature of the "leadership" corresponds to the
nature of the class (or of the caste) it leads and to the objective
situation through which this class (or caste) is p assing.
The Soviet bureaucracy is immeasurably more p owerful than
the reformist bureaucracies of all the capitalist countries taken
together, since it has in its hands state power and all the
advantages and privileges bound up with that. True, the Soviet
bureaucracy has grown on the soil of the victorious proletarian
revolution. But it would be the greatest naivete to idealize it for
that reason. In a poor country-and the USSR is at present still a
very poor country, where a private room, sufficient food and
clothing are within the reach of only a tiny minority of the
population-in such a country millions of bureaucrats, great and
small, make every effort to ensure before anything their own well
being! Hence the great egoism and the great conservatism of the
bureaucracy, its fright in the face of the discontent of the masses,
its hatred of criticism, its angry persistence in stifling all free
thought, and finally, its hypocritical and religious kneeling
before the "leader" who embodies and defends its unlimited
domination and its privileges. All that, taken together, is the
content of the struggle against "Trotskyism . "
I t i s absolutely beyond question and o f maj or importance that
the Soviet bureaucracy became more powerful as the blows struck
harder against the world working class. The defeats of the
revolutionary movements in Europe and Asia gradually under
mined the confidence of the Soviet workers in their international
ally. Inside the country acute misery still reigned. The boldest
and most devoted representatives of the working class had either
perished in the civil war or had risen higher and, for the main
part, been assimilated into the ranks of the bureaucracy, having
lost their revolutionary spirit. Weary, because of the terrible
efforts of the revolutionary years, without perspective, poisoned
with bitterness b ecause of a s eries of disappointments, the great
mass fell into passivity. Reaction of this kind is to be seen, as we
have already s aid, after every revolution. The immense historical
advantage of the October Revolution, taken as a proletarian
revolution, is that the exhaustion and the disappointment have
benefited not the class enemy, the bourgeoisie and the aristoc-
How Did Stalin Defeat the Opposition ? 175
racy, but the upper layer of the working class itself and the
intermediary groups linked with it who have entered the Soviet
bureaucracy.
The genuine revolutionary proletarians in the USSR drew their
strength not from the apparatus but from the activity of the
revolutionary masses. In particular, the Red Army was created
not by "men of the apparatus" (in the most critical years the
apparatus was still very weak) , but by the cadres of heroic
workers who , under Bolshevik leadership, gathered around them
the young peas ants and led them into battle. The decline of the
revolutionary movement, the weariness, the defeats in Europe
and in Asia, the disappointment of the working masses, were
inevitably and directly to weaken the positions of the
internationalist-revolutionaries and, on the other hand, were to
strengthen the positions of the n ational and conservative
bureaucracy. A new chapter opens in the revolution. The leaders
of the preceding period go into opposition while the conservative
politicians of the apparatus, who had p layed a secondary role in
the revolution, emerge with the triumphant bureaucracy, in the
forefront.
As for the military apparatus, it is a part of the bureaucratic
apparatus, in no way distinguished in qualities from it. It is
enough to say that in the years of the civil war, the Red Army
absorbed tens of thousands of former czarist officers. O n March
13, 1919, Lenin said to a meeting in P etrograd: "When Trotsky
told me recently that, in the military sphere, the number of our
officers was several tens of thousands, then I had a concrete
picture of what is meant by the secret of using our enemy: how to
have communism built by those who were formerly our enemies ;
build communism with bricks collected against us b y the
capitalists! And we have no other bricks ! " These cadres of officers
and fun ctionaries carried out their work in the first years under
the direct pressure and surveillance of the advanced workers. In
the fire of the cruel struggle, there could not be even a question of
a privileged position for officers: the very word was scrubbed out
of the vocabulary. But precisely after the victories had been won
and the passage made to a peaceful situation, the military
apparatus tried to become the most influential and privileged
part of the whole bureaucratic apparatus. The only person who
would h ave relied on the officers for the purpose of seizing power
would have been someone who was prepared to go further than
the appetites of the officer caste, th at is to say, who would have
ensured for them a superior position , given them ranks and
1 76 Writings of Leon Trotsky (1 935-36)
decorations, in a word, would have done in one single act what

the Stalinist bureaucracy has done gradually over the succeeding
ten to twelve years. There is no doubt that it would have been
possible to carry out a military coup d'etat against the faction of
Zinoviev, Kamenev, Stalin, etc . , without any difficulty and
without even the shedding of any blood; but the result of such a
coup d'etat would have been to accelerate the rhythm of this very
bureaucratization an d Bonapartism against which the Left
Opposition had engaged in struggle.
The task of the Bolshevik-Leninists was by its very essence not
to rely on the military bureaucracy against that of the party but
to rely on the proletarian vanguard and through it on the popular
masses, and to master the bureaucracy in its entirety, to purge it
of its alien elements, to ensure the vigilant control of the workers
over it, and to set its policy back on the rails of revolutionary
internationalism . But as the living fountain of the revolutionary
strength of the masses was dried up in civil war, famine, and
epidemics , and as the bureaucracy grew terribly in numbers and
insolence, the revolutionary proletarians became the weaker side.
To be sure, the banner of the Bolshevik-Leninists gathered tens of
thousands of the best revolutionary fighters, including some
military men. The advanced workers were sympathetic to the
Opposition, but that sympathy remained passive; the masses no
longer believed that the situation could be seriously changed by
struggle. Meanwhile the bureaucracy asserted: "The Opposition
proposes international revolution and is ready to drag us into a
revolutionary war. Enough of shake-ups and misery. We have
earned the right to rest. We need no more of 'permanent
revolution . ' 2 1 3 We will build the socialist society at home. Workers
and peasants , rely on us, your leaders !" This nationalist and
conservative agitation was accompanied-to mention it in
passing-by furious slanders , s o metimes absolutely reactionary,
against the internationalists. It drew the military and state
bureaucracies tightly together, and indubitably found an echo in
the weary and backward masse s . So the Bolshevik vanguard
found itself isolated and crushed piecemeal. Therein lies the
secret of the victory of the Thermidorean bureaucracy.
Talk about the extraordinary tactical and organizational
qualities of Stalin is a myth , deliberately created by the
bureaucracy of the USSR and of the C ommunist International
and repeated by left bourgeois intellectuals who , despite their
individualism, willingly bend the knee to success . These gentle
men neither understood nor recognized Lenin when, pursued by
the international scum, he prepared the revolution. On the other
How Did Stalin Defeat the Opposition ? 1 77
hand, they "recognized" Stalin when this recognition brought

only satisfaction and sometimes direct advantages .
The initiative for the struggle against the Left Opposition
belongs properly not to Stalin but to Zinoviev. At first Stalin
hesitated and w aited. It would be wrong to think that Stalin even
had a strategic plan from the outset. He kept testing the ground.
There is no doubt that his revolutionary Marxist tutelage
weighed on him . In effect, he s ought a simpler, more national,
"surer" policy. The success which attended him was something
unexpected, in the first place by himself. It was the success of the
new leading l ayer, of the revolutionary aristocracy which was
trying to liberate itself from the control of the masses and which
needed a strong and reliable arbiter in its internal affairs. Stalin ,
a figure of the second rank in the proletarian revolution,
appeared as the unchallenged leader of the Thermidorean
bureaucracy, first in its ranks-nothing more.
The Italian fascist or semifascist writer Malaparte has
published a book, Coup d'Etat: The Technique of Revolution, in
which he develops the idea that "Trotsky's revolutionary tactics"
in contrast to Lenin's strategy could assure victory in a given
country under given condition s . It is difficult to imagine any
theory that could be more absurd! However, the sages who :use
hindsight to accuse us of losing power because of indecision, at
bottom look at things from Malaparte's point of view: they think
that there are certain special technical "secrets " with whos e help
revolutionary power can be won or preserved, independently of
the effect of great obj ective factors (victory or defeat for the
revolution in the East and the West, the rise or fall of the mass
movement in a country, etc.) . Power is not a prize which the most
"skillful" win . Power is a relationship between individuals , in the
last analysis b etween classes. Governmental l eadership, as we
have said, is a powerful lever for success . But that does not at all
mean that the leadership can guarantee victory under all
condition s .
What is decisive in the last analysis are the class struggle and
the internal modifications produced inside the struggling masses.
It is impossible, to be sure, to reply with mathematical
precision to the question: How would the struggle have developed
had Lenin been alive? That Lenin would have been the
implacable enemy of the greedy conservative bureaucracy and of
Stalin 's policy, which steadily bound to itself all of his own kind,
is indisputably demonstrated in a whole series of letters , articles,
and proposals by Lenin in the last period of his life, especially in
his testament, in which he recommends that Stalin be removed
from the post of general secretary, and finally from his last letter,
in which he breaks off "all personal and comradely relations"
with Stalin. 2 1 4 In the period between the two attacks of his
illness, Lenin proposed a common faction with me to struggle
against the bureaucracy and its general staff, the Organizational
Bureau of the Central Committee, where Stalin was in command.
For the Twelfth Party Congress, Lenin-to use his own
expression-was preparing a "bomb" against Stalin. All this has
been told-on the basis of precise and indisputable documents
in my autobiography and in a s pecial article, "On the Suppressed
Testament of Lenin. " Lenin's preparatory measures show that he
thought that the imminent struggle would be very difficult; not
because-there is no doubt about it-he feared Stalin personally
as an opponent (it would be ridiculous to speak of that) but
because he s aw clearly behind Stalin's b ack the tissue of the
common interests of the powerful caste of the leading bureaucra
cy. While Lenin was still alive, Stalin was conducting a s apping
operation by means of agents cautiously spreading the rumor
that Lenin was an invalid intellectual, out of touch with the
situation, etc . , in a word, putting into circulation the same legend
which has now become the unofficial version of the Communist
International to explain the acute hostility between Lenin and
Stalin during the last year and a half of Lenin's life. In fact, all
the articles and letters that Lenin dictated when he was ill
represent perhaps the ripest fruits of his thought. The perspicaci
ty of this "invalid" would h ave been more than enough for a
dozen Stalins .
I t can b e s aid with certainty that i f Lenin had lived longer, the
pressure of bureaucratic omnipotence would have been exerted
at least in the first years-more lightly. But in 1926 Krupskaya
said to a group of Left Oppositionists, "If Lenin were alive today
he would now be in prison. " 2 1 5 The fears and alarming
forebodings of Lenin were still fresh in her memory, and she had
absolutely no illusions as to the personal omnipotence of Lenin,
understanding, in her own words, the dependence of the best
helmsman on the winds and on favorable or contrary currents.
Does that mean that Stalin's victory was inevitable? Does that
mean that the struggle of the Left Opposition (Bolshevik
Leninists) was hopeless? Such a way of putting the question is
abstract, schematic, and fatalistic. The development of the
struggle has shown, without any doubt, that the Bolshevik
Leninists would not have been able to win a complete victory in
the USSR-that is to say, conquer power and cauterize the ulcer
of bureaucratism-witho ut support from the world revolution. But
How D id Stalin Defeat the Opposition ? 179
that in no way means that their struggle did not h ave results.
Without the Opposition's bold criticism and without the bureau
cracy's fear of the Opposition, the course of Stalin-Bukharin
toward the kulak [wealthy peasant] would have ended up in the
revival of capitalism. Under the lash of the Opposition the
bureaucracy was forced to make important borrowings from our
platform. The Leninists could not save the Soviet regime from the
process of degeneration and the difficulties of the personal
regime. But they s aved it from complete dissolution by barring
the road to capitalist restoration. The progressive reforms of the
bureaucracy were the by-products of the Opposition's revolution
ary struggle. For us it is far too insufficient. But it is still
something.
On the arena of the world workers' movement, on which the
Soviet bureaucracy depends only indirectly, the situation is
immensely more unfavorable yet to the USSR. Through the
intermediary of the Communist International, Stalinism has
become the worst brake on the world revolution. Without Stalin
there would have been no Hitler. At the pres ent moment in
France, by the policy of prostration whose political name is the
"People's Front, " Stalinism is preparing a new defeat for the
proletariat.
But here, too, the Left Opposition's struggle has not been
sterile. Throughout the whole world are growing and multiplying
cadres of genuine proletarian revolutionaries, real Bolsheviks,
who are j oining not the Soviet bureaucracy in order to use its
authority and treasury, but the program of Lenin and the banner
of the October Revolution. Under the truly monstrous persecu
tions-also without precedent in history-by the j oint forces of
imperialism, reformis m , and Stalinism, the Bolshevik-Leninists
are growing, strengthening themselves , and increasingly gaining
the confidence of the advanced workers. An infallible symptom of
the crisis which is being produced is the magnificent evolution of
the Socialist Youth of the Seine.
The world revolution will go forward under the banner of the
Fourth International. Its first successes will not leave standing
one stone upon another of the omnipotence of the Stalinist clique,
its lies, its slanders, and its hollow reputations. The Soviet
republic, like the world proletarian v anguard, will finally liberate
itself from the bureaucratic octopus. The historic collapse of
Stalinism is predetermined and it will be a merited punishment
for its innumerable crimes against the world working class. We
want and look forward to no other revenge!
A VENERABLE SMERDYAKOV 21 6
November 1935
In the anniversary issue of Izvestia, some Smerdyakov or other

devotes himself to reminiscences of the October days in
Petrograd. It goes without saying that "October was victorious
because the line of Lenin-Stalin was victorious . " Nothing else, of
course, was to be expected. In the last five-six years, the historical
law of "Stalinism" has finally acquired retroactive force and has
subj ected past history to reworking. But there is one very
interesting little concrete touch in the memoirist's article, at least
for those who know where the Smerdyakov's boot pinches. Here
is what we read: " Under the direct leadership of the military
center (Stalin, Sverdlov, Dzerzhinsky, Bubnov, Uritsky), the
Military Revolutionary Committee energetically prepared the
armed uprising. " 2 1 7
This kind of allusion to the "direct leadership of the military
center" is occurring for the first time in these reminiscences . The
"military center, " as is known, was discovered by chance in old
minutes of the Central Committee only in 1923. The trouble,
unfortunately, was that none of the organizers of the October
Revolution had ever heard of this center. In all the memoirs of the
most immediate leaders of the uprising, written in the first years
after the revolution until the discovery of the minutes, and in all
the documents of the October period, there is no hint of the
activity of a special "military center. " In Trotsky's History of the
Russian Revolution it is proved , using completely irrefutable
factual data and eyewitness accounts, coming mainly from the
camp of V'lhat are now Stalinists-proved once and for all-that
the so-called "party military center" never existed.
True, it was at all events elected, toward the end of a night
session of the C C , at the very moment when the Military
Revolutionary Committee, the real leader of the uprising, was set
up in the Smolny. By the very next day, everyone had already
forgotten the "military center," including the members of the
Central Committee appointed to it. It produced no decisions, since
180
A Venerable Smerdyakov 181
it never even met once. As was said above, the fact that it had
been appointed was discovered only six years later, in an
examination of old archives . Incidentally, there were mentioned
in them a s eries of other " centers" which were appointed in
passing by the CC in the whirlpool of 1 9 1 7 and which never
existed in fact.
One of the most active participants in the O ctober Revolution,
Antonov-Ovseenko,218 in his numerous and voluminous memoirs,
never mentioned a word about the "military center," far less with
the name of Stalin in the first place. In those first years,
Antonov-Ovseenko, like Stalin himself, named quite different
leaders of the uprising. A striking case of aberration of memory!
It took a whole eighteen years for a participant in the O ctober
Revolution to bring his memories finally into complete order, i . e . ,
t o group them around t h e personality of Stalin. For-as we have
been forgetting to mention-the Smerdyakov we are talking
about is none other than the former revolutionary, Antonov
Ovseenko.
These gentlemen may deceive Young C ommunists and Pio
neers . 2 1 9 But they will not deceive history; the Stalin apparatus of
falsification is insufficient for that. And since that is so, some
day, sooner or later, the Young Communists and the Pioneers will
also find out the truth. In E urope and in America, the young are
already turning toward the truth. A fresh wind is blowing. And
no Smerdyakovs will be able to poison it with the gases of their
belated memoirs .
TWO STATEMENTS O N
THE CANNON-SHACHTMAN LETTER 22 0
A Brief Remark
November 1935
The letter of Comrades C annon and Shachtman having a

private character, like a number of letters from comrades of other
tendencies, its publication is a deplorable mistake on the part of
the apparatus of the IS. I am s aying so in an official letter. In
any case, every informed reader must understand that personal
characteriz ations are characteristic of struggle during an
impassioned discussion. Every one of us, in letters not meant for
publication, makes such exaggerations meant to emphasize our
thought better. Cannon and Shachtman knew perfectly well that
by their epigrammatic characterizations they could in no way
disqualify in my eyes comrades whom I sincerely love and
esteem.
It would be truly deplorable if this unpardonable publication
could envenom, however little, the life of the party. While
awaiting the official lettex:, you could translate this brief remark
for the Political Bureau for any purpose.
L . D . Trotsky
An Obvious Error
November 13 , 1935
Dear Comrades :
The letter of Comrades Cannon and Shachtman, according to
its content and tone, had a private character destined for an
intimate circle of informed comrades. I personally have received
from several other American comrades repres enting other groups
personal letters of the same kind, occasionally containing sharp
assessments of certain comrades or groups. Every experienced
182
The Cannon-Shachtman Letter 183
comrade knows that during any serious and impassioned

discussion such letters are quite inevitable. It is always necessary
to interpret the sharpest critical assessment in connection with
the given conjuncture, and not as final characterizations of men
and tendencies.
That granted, the publication of the personal l etter of Cannon
and Shachtman in the bulletin, which is intended for wide
distribution, was an obvious error which I can only explain by
haste and a lack of prudence. I do not doubt that the comrades
who published the letter have themselves easily recognized the
great error they committed and will draw all the necessary
conclusions for the future. Without personal correspondence
between the leading comrades of the various sections our work
would be much m ore difficult. However, the publication of such
private letters would make all frank personal correspondence
impossible.
Every reader of the bulletin of the IS will easily understand, I
hope, that in their private letters Comrades Cannon and
Shachtman had no intention of disqualifying or compromising
their temporary adversaries. All the more so since the authors of
the letter are very well aware of my warm and fraternal feelings
toward these "adversaries . " Comrades Cannon and Shachtman
wanted only to emphasize in a sharp manner their differences
with the given groups and people.
No other interpretation could b e placed on the letter in
question. I strongl y hope that the misplaced publication of this
letter will not injure friendly collaboration inside the American
party and will not diminish by an iota the fraternal consideration
and the warm sympathy of all the other sections toward the
brother American party.
Crux [Trotsky]
FACTIO N S AND THE
FOURTH I NTE RNATIONAL22 1
1935
The work of building the Fourth International is now already

being developed on a significantly wider b asis than was the work
to build the Bolshevik-Leninist faction . Under the impetus of the
decay of reformism and Stalinism, the intensification of the class
struggle, and the impending danger of war, groups with a variety
of origins will be knocking on the door of the Fourth Interna
tional.
The Fourth International will not allow anyone-of this we
h ave no doubt-to take lightly either our principles or our
discipline. But what this discipline will entail cannot be decreed
beforehand: it must be h ammered out in a common struggle; it
must be guided by the experiences-well thought out and
critically examined-of the overwhelming maj ority of the
participants . In this sense, it should be acknowledged that the
[Belgian] Spartacus group's adherence to the Fourth Internation
al is a positi ve factor. It opens up serious opportunities for this
group to free itself from the pitfalls of sectarianism, and thereby
promises to win uncorrupted and devoted workers b ack into our
ranks.
Now, with a new International in formation, the question of
factions inside the revolutionary party takes on enormous
importance. But it is just this issue that caused such terrible
trouble and demoralization in the years of the Comintern's
ascendancy .
In the Comintern , factions were forbidden, and this police ban
was alleged to be in keeping with the Bolshevik tradition. It is
difficult to im agine a worse slan der on the his tory of Bolshevis m .
It is true that i n March 1 9 2 1 faction,; wen' b anned by a special
resolution of the Ten th Party Congress . Th e very fact that this
resolution was necessary shows that in th e previous p eriod-i.e.,
during the seventeen years when Bolshevism arose, grew, gained
184
Factions and the Fourth International 1 85
strength, and came to power-factions were a legitimate part of

party life. And this was reflected in practice.
At the Stockholm Party Congress ( 1 906), where the Bolsh evik
faction was reunited with the Menshevik faction , there were two
factions inside the Bolshevik faction involved in an open struggle
at the congress itself over a major question , the agrarian
program . The maj ority o f the Bolsheviks, under Lenin' s lead er
ship, had come out for n ationalization of the land. Stalin, who
spoke at the congress under the name I vanovich, belonged to a
small group of so-called " partitionists" that advocated the
immediate partitioning of the land among the small property
owners, thus restricting the revolution beforehand to a capitalist
farmer perspective.
In 1907, a sharp factional struggle was fought over the question
of boycotting the Third State Duma [parliament). The supporters
of the boycott subsequently aligned themselves into two factions
which over the next few years carried on a fierce struggle against
Lenin's faction, not only within the confines of the "united"
party, but inside the Bolshevik faction as well. Bolshevism's
intensified struggle against liquidationism later on gave ris e to a
conciliationist faction inside the Bolshevik faction, to which
prominent B olshevik practical party w orkers of that time
belonged: Rykov, Dubrovinsky, Stalin, and others . 2 2 2 The
struggle against the conciliationists dragged on until the
outbreak of the war.
August 1 9 1 4 opened a p eriod of regroupment inside the
Bolshevik faction on the b asis of attitudes toward the war and
the Socond International. Simultaneously a factional group was
beir , ."Jrmed of people who opposed national self-determination
( Bukharin, Pyatakov, and others) .223
The sharp factional struggle inside the Bolshevik faction in the
first period after the February Revolution224 and on the eve of the
October Revolution is now well enough kn own (see for example,
L. Trotsky , History of the Russian Revolution). After th e conquest
of power a sharp factional struggle broke out around the question
of the Brest-Litovsk peace. A faction of Left Communists was
formed with its own press (Bukharin , Yaroslavsky, and others).22 5
Subsequently, the Democratic Centralism and the Workers'
Opposition factions were formed.226 Not until the Tenth Party
Congress, held un der conditions of blockade and famine, growing
peasant unrest, and the first stages of NEp227-which had
unleashed petty-bourgeois tendencies-was consideration given
to the possibility of resorting to such an exceptional measure as
the banning of factions. It is possible to regard the decision of the

Tenth Congress as a grave necessity. But in light of later events,
one thing is absolutely clear: the banning of factions brought the
heroic history of Bolshevism to an end and made way for its
bureaucratic degeneration.
Beginning in 1923 the epigones extended the banning and
stifling of factional struggle from the ruling p arty in the USSR to
the young sections of the Comintern, thus dooming them to
degeneration before they had time to grow and develop.
Does this mean, however, that the revolutionary party of the
proletariat must or can represent simply the sum total of its
factions? In order to better shed light on this question we will
take for the s ake of comparison the French Socialist Party, which
has legalized factions in its statutes, introducing the principle of
proportional representation for all party elections. In this sense
the French section of the Second International passed itself off
for a long tim e and not without success as the p urest expression
of "party democracy." And formally it is, or rather it was. But
just as the pure democracy of b ourgeois society acts as a cover for
the actual rule of the upper echelon of property-owners, so the
most ideal democracy of the Second International hides the rule
of an unofficial but powerful faction: the p arliamentary and
municipal careerists . This faction, while keeping a firm grip on
the apparatus , allows the left-wing faction to make very
revolutionary-sounding speeches; but as soon as the genuine
Marxist faction, for whom word and deed go hand in hand,
begins to expose the hypocrisy of the party's democracy, the
apparatus faction quickly takes the course of expulsion.
Because the Bolsheviks joined this reformist party not for
adaptation but for a fight, a collision with the ruling faction was
determined b eforehand. The threat of imminent war and the
social-patriotic turn of the Comintern hastened the conflict and
right away lent it an exceptional acuteness. If the social patriots
expel the revolutionaries instead of vice versa, it is the
relationship of forces that is to blame-about this no one has the
slightest illusions . Entry into the Socialist Party made it possible
to achieve a little, but by no means did it achieve everything. It
has allowed our French section to considerably expand its
influence. The struggle between internationalism and social
patriotism was posed with remarkable clarity. As regards
organizational balance sheets , it is still too early to draw them
up : the struggle inside the French Socialist Party is still far from
over.
Factions and the Fourth International 1 87
There are a few sagacious individuals (frequently they are

former opponents of entryism) who say: the Bolshevik-Leninists
are behaving in too reckless a manner inside the Socialist
Party-for example, in advancing the call for a Fourth Interna
tional, and so forth. This mistaken political vision is often
encountered in politics; success is so alluring that one wishes it
could develop in an uninterrupted manner. At times like this it is
easy to lose sight of the fact that there may exist in the world an
adversary who h as eyes and ears. Only quite hopeless simpletons
can think that the call for a Fourth International frightened
Blum and Company. This is utter nonsense! It was the imminent
threat of war and the Comintern's undisguised treachery,
tremendously strengthening the position of social patriotism, at
least for the time immediately ahead, that compelled Leon Blum
and Company to assume the offensive. To think that one "iU
advised" expression or another-and such are inevitable in the
heat of struggle-could play a serious role in the question of
expulsion means to be too superficial and flippant in evaluating
the opponent.
If the leadership clique made a decision in favor of expulsion,
in defiance of the traditional myth of democracy, it must have
had serious and pressing reasons for doing s o . It is not difficult to
find a reason: not only Mussolini but Blum as well always has
his Wal-Wal for an emergency . 2 2 8
We have b u t t o review t h e m o s t recent experience o f the French
Socialist Party to see precisely why the party cannot be simply
the sum of its factions. A p arty can tolerate those factions that
are not pursuing goals directly opposite its own . When the
traditional left wing in the French Socialist Party was innoc
uously marking time, it was tolerated; more than that, it was
encouraged. Blum never referred to the m argarine revolutionary
Zyromsky as anything other than "my friend." This title, used
also with reference to Frossard, 2 2 9 meant: that person was needed
as a cover for the ruling clique, either from the left or from the
right. But the Leninists-for whom word and deed are not at
variance-were something the democracy of the social-patriotic
party could not tolerate.
The revolutionary party presents a definite program and
definite tactics. This places definite and very distinct limits on
the internal struggle of tendencies and groupings in advance.
Now, after the destruction of the Second and Third Internation
als, the guidelines take on an especially graphic and distinct
character. The very fact of membership in the Fourth Interna-
188 Writings of Leon Trotsky (1935"36)
tional cannot but be contingent upon observance of a certain

body of restrictions which reflect all the experiences of previous
working class movements . But although the limits on the internal
ideological struggle are thus established in advance, the struggle
itself, carried on within the limits of general principles, is not at
all denied . It is inevitable; and when it is within the prescribed
limits , it is fruitful. It is not discussion, of course, that gives the
life of the party its fun damental content, but struggle. Where
endless discussion feeds endless discussion, there can only be
decay and disintegration. But where discussion is rooted in the
common struggle, where it puts the struggle under a critical light
and prepares for its new stages-there, discussion is an element
that is indispensable for development.
The discussion of serious questions is inconceivable without
groupings. But under normal conditions they are subsequently
dissolved into the party organism, especially because of new
experiences, which always provide the best test in cases where
there are p olitical disagreements . The conversion of groupings
into permanent factions is in itself a disturbing symptom that
signifies either that the struggling tendencies are totally
irreconcilable or that the party as a whole has reached a
deadlock. It is impossible to avert such a situation, of course, by
simply banning factions. To wage a war against the symptom
does not mean to cure the disease. Only a correct policy and a
healthy internal administrative structure and procedure can
prevent the conversion of temporary groupings into ossified
factions.
The health of the regime depends to a great degree on the
leadership of the party and its ability to lend a timely ear to the
voice of its critics. A stubborn policy of asserting bureaucratic
"prestige" is destructive to the development of the proletarian
organization and to the authority of the leadership as well. But
goodwill on the part of the leadership alone is not enough. The
opposition grouping is also responsible for the character of inner
party relations. In a faction struggle against the reformists,
revolutionists frequently resort to extreme measures, although as
a general rule in faction fights , the reformists conduct thems elves
in a much more ruthless and decisive m anner. But in this case for
both sides it was a matter of preparing to make the break under
conditions that would be most advantageous. Those who transfer
such methods to work inside a revolutionary organization reveal
either political immaturity and the lack of any sense of
responsibility; or anarchistic individualism, more often than not
Factions and the Fourth International 189
concealed beneath sectarian principles; or, finally, that they are

alien to the revolutionary organization.
A sense of proportio n in a faction struggle grows with the
increased maturity of the organization and the increased
authority of its leadership. When Vereecken tries to m ake it
appear that the "sectarians " expelled him because of his loyalty
to Marxist principles, we can only shrug our shoulders. In fact,
the Vereecken group displayed political immaturity in m aking a
break with an organization that had proven its loyalty to M arxist
principles for many years . If Vereecken now has the opportunity
to j oin in the work of building the Fourth International, he owes
this opportunity-above all-to the international organization
which he broke from by the force of his quick sectarian temper.
AN ANSWER TO
C O MRADE S I N ANVERS 2 3 0
November 1935
To the International Secretariat:

The letter from the group of comrades in Anvers is without any
doubt dictated by the best intentions, but it contains a series of
obvious misunderstandings.
a. The Anvers comrades accuse us of not insisting on common
work between Charleroi and Vereecken. They consider our
attitude to be dictated by an "incorrect" feeling toward Ve
reecken. The Anvers friends shut their eyes, in an astonishing
way, to the fact that the Charleroi group is not now connected
with the IS and did not sign the Open Letter.
What is the reason for this? The special situation of the
Charleroi group within the Belgian [Labor] Party and within its
left wing. Whether the political line of Charleroi is correct or not
is a separate question; but that political line has its logic. In
setting itself the task of influencing the left wing by friendly
collaboration with it, the Charleroi group does not want to appear
to the left wing as an agent of an organization outside the party.
Is such a policy of "accommodation" legitimate? To be sure, it
has its dangerous aspects. But they can be more than balanced
by positive results , given firm internal cohesiveness. If the
Charleroi group considers it impossible, in the present period, to
maintain official ties with the IS, and doesn't sign the Open
Letter, how then can one demand that this group enter into
official connection with Vereecken? It must be added that neither
the Secretariat, nor the organizations that have signed the Open
Letter, thought or think of the Charleroi comrades as capitulators
or as traitors . Whereas precisely these accusations have been
hurled at them by Comrade Vereecken, who has not retracted his
false and obviously sectarian accusations to this very day.
b. The Secretariat is ready to do everything to facilitate
collaboration in the future; it has proved this by offering
1 90
An Answer to Comrades in Anvers 191
Comrade Vereecken the opportunity t o sign the Open Letter and

by submitting all the documents to him . It only takes two seconds
to break a leg, but for the bone to mend requires several months.
We are all well aware of the positive and revolutionary qualities
of Comrade Vereecken, his ideological intransigence, his devotion
to the cause, his perseverance. But over the years we have learned
only too well his negative qualities also: the absence of b alance
and a sense of proportion, the inclination to excessive exaggera
tion, indiscipline, and capriciousness-all these traits are
characteristic of sectarianism. Democratic centralism imposes
obligations on an opposition too: if everyone wanted to do only
what pleased him, it would inevitably destroy both democracy
and centralism. I do not know where the Anvers comrades have
witnessed the ideal democratic centralism which they, following
Vereecken, hold up against us; not on this mortal earth, I'm sure.
But we believe that there is at present no other organization that
discusses so honestly and with such good faith, not only in form
but in essence, and decides all contested matters so democratical
ly, as our organization does . Of course, not a few mistakes are
committed. But Vereecken commits ten times as many errors
against the ABC of democratic centralism as Charleroi. Ve
reecken's August article is not only wrong but criminal in its total
lack of balance and of sense of proportion. Not one worker who
really believes Vereecken's article will j oin the Fourth Interna
tional, and since Vereecken's group is condemned to vegetate
ineffectually outside the Fourth International, his article can
only sap his own foundations . That is the fate of sectarianism in
general. On the French and B elgian questions (not to mention the
others) Vereecken has made so m any errors that he was forced to
become more prudent. Nevertheless, when the IS threw him a
lifeline, his answer was to throw stones at them. That is the
reason why I, for one, have been obliged to write an article
against sectarianism for our press, taking Vereecken as a model.
c. Speaking of democratic centralism, the Anvers comrades
picture things as though the Charleroi group does what the
Secretariat " orders ." In reality, Charleroi has determined its
entire political line, while not as anarchistically as Vereecken,
still, with great independence. I personally have been far from
agreeing with all the steps of our Charleroi friends, and I have
told them so more than once. But I consider them to be comrades,
and not capitulators and traitors . There is the difference. But
Vereecken wants to maintain the right to scathe them as
capitulators and at the same time . . . demand their collabora-
tion. Naturally, Charleroi is unlikely to accept. To regain our

complete confidence, that is, to eliminate the fear of new
anarchistic goings-on , Vereecken will have to openly recognize
that his position on the French question has been incorrect from
beginning to end, and that his accusations against the Secretar
iat have been refuted by the facts , just like his accusations
against the Charleroi group.
Practical conclusion: The bone broken by Vereecken must be
patiently and persistently mended. For that to happen, it is
necessary for Vereecken to remain among the groups of the
Fourth International. That n aturally does not mean that he gives
up the right to criticize. But h e has to use that right with balance
and proportion (that is the dividing line between Marxist
criticism and sectarian criticism). And it would not be amiss if he
added . . . a little self-criticism too. Under these condition s , the
reconstruction of unity would be assured. By what path? I cannot
predict that. Here a great deal depends on the special situation of
the Charleroi group. But this special situation will not last
forever. The revolutionary party to come can and must be
prepared from different sides simultaneously.
Crux [Trotsky]
TACTICAL QUE STIONS AND SPLITS 2 3 1
Nov ember 1 8 , 1935
Comrade Vereecken:
I have already replied to the general questions raised in your
letter in the article "Sectarianism, Centrism, and the Fourth
In tern ational" (l argely directed against your article in August
and p artly in reply to your cothinkers at Anvers). I will also
request that a copy of m y article on sectarianism be sent to you.
If it is correct that you are in agreement with us on the
principled questions and that you broke with us only on a tactical
question, which you now consider an episode of the past-this
admission is a merciless condemnation of your policy. How can
one split and compromise the only M arxist internationalist
organization because of an episodic tactical differen ce?
You yourself refer to the fact that we have not expelle d the
Dutch section, which was against the "entry," and have even
introduced an "opponent of th e entry" into the IS. 232 Exactly! But
this argument is also entirely directed against you. It shows that
we have had and we have shown neither intolerance nor haste
but on the contrary a sincere aspiration to continue to work
amicably with comrades temporarily separated from us on a
tactical question. Democratic centralism, to which you so
imprudently and incorrectly refer, presupposes a discipline of
action and does not tolerate sectarian whims .
You demand a discussion o n the results o f the French
experience. Being separated from us, you are, alas, a century
behind th e times. The successes of our French section are so
striking and conclusive, especially in recent months (do not forget
that only the leaders have been expelled), that we consi d er it
ridiculous to waste any time in a discussion of last year's snow.
It is by such a discussion, however, that the Oehler group
continues to disrupt our p arty . The leadership of the American
party, the IS, and we have done everything p ossible to convince
the Oehler group of their false position. We have not had any
success . Sabotaging the p arty, remaining in contact with the
193
1 94 Writings of Leon Trotsky (1935-36)
people who have betrayed and with the deserters, Bauer and
Company, not submitting to discipline, circulating the vilest
slanders about our international organization, about our French
and Belgian sections, the Oehler group demands for itself . . .
democratic centralism, that is to s ay, the right to sit in j udgment
over the overwhelming majority. As far as I can judge from here
the expulsion of the Oehler group has b ecome absolutely
necessary. If only episodic tactical differences are involved, then
how explain the monstrous sharpness of the struggle? I explain it
thus: agreement with a principle has only a purely formal
character; what is involved is the last convulsion of sectarianism
against Bolshevik policy.
You speak not only of the Spartacus group but of all the
opponents of the "entry." Whom have you in mind? You must
enumerate very precisely all the groups of your cothinkers in all
the countries. For my part, I will s ay that none of these groups
have signed the Open Letter for the Fourth International. Most of
them are flirting with the centrists (SAP, etc.) Lhuiller has
entered the Socialist Party but there he has voted not for the
resolutions of the Bolshevik-Leninists but for the resolution of
Marceau Pivert.233 With whom do you solidarize yourself on the
international arena? We must know this precisely when
rapprochement is spoken of: you are well aware of whom we are
in s olidarity with.
You will agree that it would show light-mindedness to unify
now only in order to split during the war, in illegality, etc.
Organizational tactics, turns, and maneuvers-there are still
many of them before us, in the event of war as well. It is not at all
excluded that precisely during a w ar the Bolshevik-Leninists of
this or that country will find themselves obliged to temporarily
enter a reformist party. Must we every time, in illegality, renew
the archabstract discussion on "capitulation to the Second
International"? We do not want to do this. It is time to grow up. It
is in this sense that I wrote that policy during war is the
continuation of policy during peace.
I do not at all wish to deny that Spartacus has favorably
distinguished itself from the other opponents of the "entry"
because: (1) it signed the Open Letter; (2) it aspires to a
rapprochement with the Bolshevik-Leninists, instead of systemat
ically slandering them, as the B auers, the Lhuillers, the Fields,
the Weisbords, the Oehlers have done and still do. That is why
every one of us cannot but welcome the participation of your
group in all the preparatory work for the Fourth International.
But as for our faction, the Bolshevik-Leninists, we are here
Tactical Questions and Splits 1 95
obliged to be m ore rigorous. Your article of August showed that

you did not understand the depths of the mistake which you
committed and that you are even inclined to j ustify it by
repeating the false accusations of the SAP and of the worst
sectarian groupings . In this case it is better to postpone
unification with our faction until experience gives serious
guarantees that future unity will b e solid.
Now on the subj ect of your practical proposals. It would be very
desirable, of course , to convene a conference of all the organiza
tions that are for the Fourth International, but it would be hardly
possible to limit it to E urope; the participation of the United
States , Canada, and to the extent possible, South Africa, would
be extremely desirable, if not indispensable. In any case, there
can be no disagreements on this question.
Your second proposal-to convene simultaneously a broader
conference of all the opponents of n ational defense, etc.-appears
to me under present conditions n ot only superfluous but even
harmful. Moreover, whom do you h ave in mind? Obviously, the
same SAP and its friends. It is astonishing that our critics and
opponents from the left show such an inclination toward this
harmful centrist clique which is the SAP. Consider who is behind
it. The only s erious and m ass party which at one time belonged to
the lAG was the Norwegian Labor Party.234 But it has long
since turned its back on the SAP; its policy is directed toward a
rapprochement with the Swedish, Danish, and British labor
parties . The small Mot-Dag group is now, as far as is known, in a
state of complete disintegration, and moreover, in general, does
not have any political value. Doriot has broken off his romance
with Walcher. The C C of our D utch party has decided to break
with the SAP and the lAG. There is a crisis in the British
Independent Labour Party: the Stalinists have left the party; the
Leninists have been very much strengthened; and one can
anticipate with certainty that the rupture of the ILP with the
Comintern will force it (not without a new crisis) toward the
Fourth International. There remains the Swedish p arty; I have
very little information on it but I think that it also will go
through the evolution of the other centrist organizations. To
attempt to revive the corpse of the lAG by an international
conference and a completely sterile discussion between four walls
with the old incorrigibl e centrists-now, that has n o meaning. We
have had enough of these futile "discussions for self-amusement."
We must go to the masses with the slogan of the Fourth
International.
"
Or perhaps you want to draw into this broad conference" the
Bordigists, the Hennaut group, etc?235 This is even less useful. If

these people have up until now not understood where they should
go, they must be left to their own fate.
Fraternal greetings,
Trotsky
ONCE AGAIN THE IL p 2 3 6
November 1935
Question: What do you mean specifically when you say, at the

conclusion of your article ["The ILP and the Fourth Internation
al"], that the ILP must still "work out a M arxist program"?
Answer: My whole article was a documentation of the in

stances in which ILP policy still fails to be Marxist, to be
revolutionary: its failure to break sharply with pacifism and with
Stalinism, to turn its face fully to the British masses, and to
reach a clear position on international organization. These
defects are one and the same. Take, for example, p a cifism.
Despite the revolutionary phraseology of What the ILP Stands
For, it is still possible in the ILP for M axton, McGovern, and
Campbell Stephen to issue an authoritative statement urging the
workers not to bear arms when war comes. 237 This is a bankrupt
policy; this is only defeatism against the workers, not revolution
ary defeatism against capitalism. Moreover, war is an interna
tional product of capitalis m and can be fought only international
ly. Which are the workers' organizations in other countrie s that
the revolutionists in the ILP must unite with? Not the Comintern,
as your pacifist leaders h ad fondly imagined, for the Comintern
is committed to social p atriotism. Not with the International
Bureau of Revolutionary Socialist Unity (lAG, the London
Bureau), for of the ten groups forming this bureau some have
expired, others are pacifist or even social patriotic, and only the
Dutch party (RSAP) is in agreement with the ILP, on the fight
against s an ctions and for independent workers' action only. This
party has long since declared for the Fourth International and
this week (about November 21, 1935) declared also for a break
with the bureau. It is, then, the Dutch party and the other p arties
openly fighting for the Fourth International with whom the ILP
must of n ecessity solidarize itself if it is to j oin in the
international revolutionary fight against war.
197
In the New Leader I read that the Lancashire, London, and

Scottish divisions of the ILP have already declared themselves to
be in opposition to the pacifist statements of the inner executive
and the similar utterances of McGovern in the House of
Common s. But this is not enough . Their fight can succeed only if
it is positive-not simply "against pacifism, " but for revolution
ary defeatism. This can only mean that the m ain fight will be for
the Fourth International.
Q: Was the ILP correct in running as m any candidates as

possible in the recent general elections, even at the risk of
splitting the vote?
A: Yes . It would have been foolish for the ILP to have

s acrificed its p olitical program in the interests of so-called unity,
to allow the Labour Party to monopolize the platform, as the
Communist Party did. We do not know our strength unless we
test it. There is always a risk of splitting, and of losing deposits ,
but such risks must be taken. Otherwise we b oycott ourselves.
Q: Was the ILP correct in refusing critical support to Labour

Party candidates who advocated military sanctions?
A: No. Economic sanctions, if real, lead to military sanctions,

to war. The ILP itself has been s aying this. It should have given
critical support to all Labour Party candidates , that is, where the
ILP itself was not contesting. In the New Leader I read that your
London division agreed to support only anti-sanctionist Labour
Party candidates. This t90 is incorrect. The Labour Party should
have been critically supported not because it was for or against
sanctions but because it represented the working class masses.
The basic error which was made by some ILPers who withdrew
critical support was to assume that the war danger necessitated a
change in our assessment of reformism. But as Clausewitz said,
and Lenin often repeated, war is the continuation of politics by
o ther means. If this is true, it applies not only to capitalist parties
but to Social Democratic parties . The war crisis does not alter the
fact that the Labour Party is a workers' p arty, which the
governmental p arty is not. Nor does it alter the fact that the
Labour Party leadership cannot fulfill its promises, that it will
b etray the confidence which the m asses place in it. In peacetime
the workers will, if they trust in Social Democracy, die of hunger;
in war, for the same reason, they will die from bullets .
Once Again the ILP 199
Revolutionists never give critical support to reformism on the

assumption that reformism, in power, could satisfy the funda
mental needs of the workers. It is possible, of course, that a
Labour government could introduce a few mild temporary
reform s . It is also possible that the League [of Nations] could
postpone a military conflict about secondary issues-j ust as a
cartel can eliminate s econdary economic crises only to reproduce
them on a larger scale. So the League can eliminate small
episodic conflicts only to generalize them into world war.
Thus , both economic and military crises will only return with
an added explosive force so long as capitalism remains . And we
know that Social Democracy cannot abolish capitalism.
No, in war as in peace, the ILP must say to the workers : "The
Labour Party will deceive you and betray you, but you do not
believe u s . Very well, we will go through your experiences with
you, but in no case do we identify ourselves with the Labour
Party program. "
Morrison, Clynes , etc., represent certain prejudices o f the
workers .238 When the ILP seeks to boycott Clynes it helps not
only Baldwin but Clynes himself. If successful in its tactic, the
ILP prevents the election of Clynes, of the Labour government,
and so prevents their exposure before the masses. The workers
will say: "If only we had had Clynes and Morrison in power,
things would have been better."
It is true, of course, that the mental content of Clynes and
Baldwin is much the same, except, p erhaps, that Baldwin is a
little more "progressive" and more courageous . But the class
content of support for Clynes is very different.
It is argued that the Labour Party already stands exposed by
its past deeds in power and its present reactionary platform. For
example, by its decision at Brighton.239 For us-yes! But not for
the masses, the eight millions who voted Labour. It is a great
danger for revolutionists to attach too much importance to
conference decisions. We use such evidence in our propaganda
but it cannot be presented beyond the power of our own press.
One cannot shout louder than the strength of one's own throat.
Let us suppose that the ILP had been successful in a boycott
tactic, had won a million workers to follow it, and that it was the
absence of this million votes which lost the election for the
Labour Party. What would happen when the war came? The
masses would in their disillusionment turn to the Labour Party,
not to us. If soviets were formed during the war the soldiers would
elect Labour Party people to them, not us. Workers would still say
that we handicapped Labour. But if we gave critical support and

by that means helped the Labour Party to power, at the same
tim e telling the workers that the Labour Party would function as
a capitalist government and would direct a capitalist war-then,
when war came, workers would see that we predicted rightly, at
the s ame time that we m arched with them . We would be elected to
the soviets and the soviets would not b etray.
As a general principle, a revolutionary party has the right to
boycott parliament only when it has the capacity to o verthrow it,
that is, when it can replace parliamentary action by general
strike and insurrection, by direct s truggle for power. In Britain
the masses still have no confidence in the ILP. The ILP is
therefore too weak to break the parliamentary machine and must
continue to use it. As for a partial boycott, such as the ILP sought
to conduct, it was unreal. At this stage of British politics it would
be interpreted by the working class as a certain contempt for
them; this is particularly true in Britain where p arliamentary
traditions are still so strong.
Moreover, the London division ' s policy of giving critical
support only to antisanctionists would imply a fundamental
distinction between the social p atriots like Morrison and
Ponsonby or-with your permission-even CrippS. 2 4 0 Actually,
their differences are merely propagandistic. Cripps is actually
only a second-rank supporter of the bourgeoisie. He has said, in
effect: "Pay no attention to my ideas; our differences are only
small . " This is the attitude of a dilettante, not a revolutionist. A
thousand times better an open enemy like Morrison. Lansbury
himself is a sincere but extravagant and irresponsible old man;
h e should be in a museum, not in Parliament. The other pacifists
are more duplicit, more shifty: like Norman Angell, who demands
more sanctions now, 2 4 1 they will easily turn into social patriots as
war develops . Then they could say to the workers : " You know us.
We were antisanctionists. Even the ILP supported our struggle.
Therefore , you can have confidence in us now when we say that
this war is a j ust war. "
N o , the ILP should have applied the same policy of critical
support to the whole of the Labour Party, only varying our
arguments to meet the slightly varied propaganda of pacifist and
social patriot. Otherwise illusions are provoked that pacifism has
more power to resist than has social patriotism . This is not true;
thei r differences are not fundamental. Even among the Tories
there are differences on sanctions and war policies . 2 4 2 The
distinction between Amery and Lansbury is simply that Amery is
more of a realist.243 Both are antisanctionists; but for the working

class, Lansbury with his illusions and sincerity is more danger
ous.
Most dangerous of all, however, is the Stalinist policy. The
parties of the Communist International try to appeal especially to
the more revolutionary workers by denouncing the League (a
denunciation that is an apology), by asking for "workers'
sanctions," and then nevertheless saying: "We must use the
League when it is for s anctions." They seek to hitch the
revolutionary workers to the sh afts so that they can draw the cart
of the League. Just as the General Council in 1926 accepted the
general strike but behind the curtains concluded a deal with the
clergy and p acifist radicals, and in this way used bourgeois
opinion and influence to "discipline" the workers and sabotage
their strike, so the Stalinists seek to discipline the workers by
confining the boycott within the limits of the League of Nations.
The truth is that if the workers begin their own s anctions
against Italy, their action inevitably strikes at their own
capitalists, and the League would be compelled to drop all
sanctions. It proposes them now just because the workers' voices
are muted in every country. Workers' action can begin only by
absolute opposition to the n ational bourgeoisie and its interna
tional combinations. Support of the League and support of
workers' actions are fire and water; they cannot be united.
Because of this, the ILP s hould have more sharply differentiat
ed itself from the CP during the elections than it did. It should
have critically supported the Labour Party against Pollitt and
Gallacher.244 It should h ave declared openly that the CP has all
the deficiencies of the Labour Party without any of its advan
tages. It should, above all, have shown in practice what true
critical support means. By accompanying support with the
sharpest and broadest criticism, by patiently explaining that
such support is only for the purpose of exposing the treachery of
the Labour Party leadership, the ILP would have completely
exposed, also, the spurious "critical" support of the Stalinists
themselves, a support which was actually wholehearted and
uncritical, and based on an agreement in principle with the
Labour Party leadership.
Q: Should the ILP seek entry into the Labour Party?
A: At the m oment the question is not posed this way. What the
ILP must do, if it is to become a revolutionary party, is to turn its
back on the CP and its face toward the mass organizations. It

must put 99 percent of its energies into building fractions in the
trade union movement. At the moment I understand that much of
the fraction work can be done openly by ILPers in the capacity of
trade union and cooperative members. But the ILP should never
rest content; it must build its influence in the mass organizations
with the utmost speed and energy. For the time may come when,
in order to reach the masses, it must enter the Labour Party, and
it must have tracks laid for the occasion. Only the experience that
comes from such fraction work can inform the ILP if and when it
must enter the Labour Party. But for all its activity an absolutely
clear program is the first condition. A small axe can fell a large
tree only if it is sharp enough.
Q: Will the Labour Party split?
A: The ILP should not assume that it will automatically grow

at the expense of the Labour Party, that the Labour Party left
wingers will be split off by the bureaucracy and come to the ILP .
These are possibilities. But i t is equally possible that the left
wing, which will develop as the crisis deepens-and particularly
now, within the trade unions, after the failure of the Labour
Party to win the elections-will be successful in its fight to stay
within the Labour Party. Even the departure of the Socialist
League to join the ILP would not end these possibilities, for the
Socialist League is very petty bourgeois in character and is not
likely to organize the militancy within the Labour Party. 245 In
any case, the history of the British general strike of 1926 teaches
us that a strong militant movement can develop in a strongly
bureaucratized trade union organization, creating a very impor
tant minority movement, without being forced out of the trade
unlOns.
Instead, what happens is that the labor fakers swing left in
order to retain control. If the ILP is not there at the critical
moment with a revolutionary leadership, the workers will need to
find their leadership elsewhere. They might still turn to Citrine,
for Citrine might even be willing to shout for soviets, for the
moment, rather than lose his hold. As Scheidemann and Ebert
shouted for soviets, and betrayed them, so will Citrine.246 Leon
Blum, under the revolutionary pressure of the French masses,
runs headlines in his Populaire: "Sanctions-but the workers
must have control," etc. It is this treacherous "heading in order to
behead" which the ILP must prevent in Britain.
Q: Is Stalinism the chief danger?
A: Of all the radical phrasemongers, the ones who offer the

greatest danger in this respect are the Stalinists. The members of
the CPGB [Communist Party of Great Britain] are now on their
bellies before the Labour Party-but this makes it all the easier
for them to crawl inside. They will make every concession
demanded of them, but once within they will still be able to pose
as the left wing because the workers still retain some illusions
about the revolutionary nature of the Comintern-ill usions which
the ILP in the past has helped to maintain. They will utilize this
illusion to corrupt the militants with their own social-patriotic
policy. They will sow seed from which only weeds can sprout.
Only a clear and courageous policy on the part of the ILP can
prevent this disaster.
Q: Would you recommend the same perspective for the ILP

Guild of Youth as for the adult party?247
A: Even more. Since the ILP youth seem to be few and

scattered, while the Labour [League of] Youth is the mass youth
organization, I would say: "Do not only build fractions-seek to
enter. " For here the danger of Stalinist devastation is extreme.
The youth are all-important. Unlike the older generation they
have little actual experience of war; it will be easier for the
Stalinists and the other pseudorevolutionary patriots to confuse
the youth on the war issues than to confuse those who survived
the last war. On the other hand, the willingness of the Stalinists
to drive these same youth into another actual war will make the
young workers properly suspicious. They will listen more easily to
us-if we are there to speak to them. No time must be lost. Out of
the new generation comes the new International, the only hope
for the world revolution. The British section will recruit its first
cadres from the thirty thousand young workers in the Labour
League of Youth. Their more advanced comrades in the ILP
youth must not allow themselves to be isolated from them,
especially now at the very moment when war is a real danger.
Q: Should the ILP terminate its united front with the CP?
A: Absolutely and categorically-yes! The ILP must learn to

turn its back on the CP and its face toward the working masses.
The permanent "unity committees" in which the ILP has sat with
the CP were nonsense in any case. The ILP and the CPGB were
propaganda organizations, not mass organizations; united fronts
between them were meaningless if each of them had the right to
advance its own program. These programs must have been
different or there would have been no justification for separate
parties, and with different programs there is nothing to unite
around. United fronts for certain specific actions could have been
of some use, of course, but the only important united front for the
ILP is with the Labour Party, the trade unions, the cooperatives.
At the moment, the ILP is too weak to secure these; it must first
conquer the right for a united front by winning the support of the
masses . At this stage, united fronts with the CP will only
compromise the ILP. Rupture with the CP is the first step toward
a mass base for the ILP and the achievement of a mass base is
the first step toward a proper united front, that is, a united front
with the mass organizations .
Q: Should the ILP forbid groupings?
A: It can scarcely do that without forbidding its leadership

which is also a group, a centrist group, protected by the party
machinery-or without denying the very factional principle by
which it must build its influence in the mass organizations.
Factions existed in the Bolshevik Party as temporary group
ings of opinion during its whole life-except for a brief period in
192 1 , when they were forbidden by unanimous vote of the
leadership as an extreme measure during an acute crisis.
Q: How far can factions develop with safety to the party?
A: That depends on the social composition of the party, upon

the political situation, and upon the quality of the leadership.
Generally it is best to let petty-bourgeois tendencies express
themselves fully so that they may expose themselves. If there are
no such tendencies, if the membership is fairly homogeneous,
there will be only temporary groupings-unless the leadership is
incorrect. And this will be shown best in practice. So, when a
difference occurs, a discussion should take place, a vote be taken,
and a maj ority line adopted. There must be no discrimination
against the minority; any personal animosity will compromise
not them but the leadership. Real leadership will be loyal and
friendly to the disciplined minority.
It is true, of course, that discussion always provokes feelings
which remain for some time. Political life is full of difficulties

personalities clash-they widen their dissensions-they get in
each other's h air. These differences must be overcome by common
experience, by education of the rank and file, by the leadership
proving it is right. Organizational measures should be resorted to
only in extreme cases. Discipline is built by education, not only
by statutes. It was the flexible life within it which allowed the
Bolshevik Party to build its discipline. Even after the conquest of
power, Bukharin and other members of the party voted against
the government in the Central Executive Committee on impor
tant questions, such as the German peace, and in so doing lined
themselves up with the Social Revolutionaries, who soon
attempted armed insurrection against the Soviet state. But
Bukharin was not expelled. Lenin said, in effect: "We will tolerate
a certain lack of discipline. We will demonstrate to them that we
are right. Tomorrow they will learn that our policy is correct, and
they will not break discipline so quickly." By this I do not advise
the dissenting comrades to imitate the arrogance of Bukharin.
Rather do I recommend that the leadership learn from the
patience and tact of Lenin. Though, when it was necessary, he
could wield the razor as well as the brush.
The authority of the national leadership is the necessary
condition of revolutionary discipline. It can be immensely
increased when it represents an international agreement of
principles, of common action. Therein lies one of the sources of
strength of the new International.
Q: What do you think of the ILP colonial policy?
A: So far, it seems to be mainly on paper. Fenner Brockway

has written some very good articles on the Mohmand struggles
and on Ethiopia. But there should be many more-and beyond
words, there should be action. The ILP should long ago have
created some kind of colonial bureau to coordinate those
organizations of colonial workers who are striving to overthrow
British imperialism. Of course, only the real revolutionists in the
ILP will bother to work for such policies. It is the test of their
revolutionary understanding.
Q: What should be the basic concept of illegal work?
A: Illegal work is work in the mass organizations-for the ILP

it is systematic entry and work in the trade unions, cooperatives,
etc. In peacetime and in war, it is the same. You will perhaps say:
"They will not let us in. They will expel us." You do not shout "I
am a revolutionist" when working in a trade union with
reactionary leadership. You educate your cadres who carry on the
fight under your direction. You keep educating new forces to
replace those expelled, and so you build up a mass opposition.
Illegal work must keep you among the working masses. You do
not retire into a cellar, as some comrades imagine. The trade
unions are the schools for illegal work. The trade union
leadership is the unofficial police of the state. The protective
covering for the revolutionist is the trade union. Transition into
war conditions is almost imperceptible.
Q: What specifically do you think the ILP should do in order to

build a new International?
A: The ILP, if it intends to become a genuine revolutionary

party, must face honestly the question of the new International.
The Second International is bankrupt, the ILP has already
said. It now recognizes the betrayal of the Third International. It
should also realize that the International Bureau of Revolution
ary Socialist Parties is a myth. It should draw the only possible
conclusion and add its name to the Open Letter for the Fourth
International.
Q: You mention that the International Bureau of Revolution

ary Socialist Parties offers no basis for the struggle against war.
What is the policy of this bureau? What is its future?
A: The bureau has no common policy; its parties are going in

all directions. The SAP of Germany now marches steadily
rightwards toward Social Democracy and Stalinism. Today I
have news that the congress of the RSAP, one of the largest
parties in the bureau, has voted by an overwhelming maj ority to
sever its old close cooperation with the SAP and also to break off
completely with the bureau and to associate with the parties
working to build the Fourth International. It even passed a vote
of censure on the Central Committee for having maintained a
connection with the SAP as long as it did.
The Spanish Workers' and Peasants' Bloc is, in a certain sense,
similar to the ILP. 24 8 Its leadership is not internationalist in
perspective but its membership includes an important section
who are for the Fourth International. The USP of Rumania is
also developing toward a revolutionary internationalist position.

Recently it expelled the tiny Stalinist faction within it, and it is
already being accused of "Trotskyism . " I hope that in the near
future they will recognize the necessity of joining in the great
work of building the Fourth International.
As for the other members of the bureau, either they are
nonentities or they have no real relation to the bureau. The
Italian SP (Maximalist) is not a party, only a microscopic group
living for the most part in exile.249 The Austrian Red Front only
two years ago had a thousand members in illegality. 250 Today it
is nonexistent, dissolved. Why? Because it had no program-no
banner! The Polish Independent Labor Party is only a topic for
humor, a caricature organization of no political importance, while
the Bulgarian LSG is never heard of.251 Like the Norwegian Mot
Dag-another "member" of the bureau-it is only a small left
wing group of intellectuals which is in the process of decomposi
tion. Here in Norway, the one workers' party is the NAP. It
belonged to the bureau for two years, but does so no more and is
in no way desirous of building a new International. Just now I
have received word that the NAP decided (on the very same day
that the Dutch party withdrew from the bureau) to sever even
formal connections-for opposite political reasons . Only two
parties of consequence remain to be considered-the ILP and the
Swedish SP.252 Already the latter grows cold to the bureau as the
SP turns to the right like the NAP. It is altogether likely that it
will follow.
The bureau suffers the fate of all centrist organizations in times
of acute class struggle; it is destroyed by the release of the
centrifugal forces within itself. We predicted that the lAG would
lose both to the right and to the left. It is happening before our
eyes , and even more quickly than we had expected. History could
not arrange a better demonstration of the correctness of our
analysis of centrism. If the ILP does not soon make up its mind it
will find itself sitting in lonely possession of the bureau.
Q: Was not Doriot also a member of the "Seven Lefts" [London

Bureau]?
A: Certainly. He may never, for his own reasons, have adhered

formally, but he was chosen with Schwab and Gorkin to form the
bureau's World Committee fl,{ Peace Work. 253 The committee, of
course, never functioned. Later, when Doriot came to terms with
Laval, he slipped out of the committee as quickly as possible.
Before, the lAG had met in St-Deni s , under his protection. Later,
when they called him on the phone it was always busy
connected with the government. Doriot is quite openly a traitor. It
is interesting that at the last lAG conference Doriot was the
loudest in condemning the Trotskyists for their slogan of the new
International, and the SAP quoted him with enthusiastic ap
proval.
Q: May not the bureau recoup its losses from other forces?
A: The course of events is not that way. Zyromsky, in France,

has been the great hope of the lAG. He was, together with Pivert,
a year in the Bataille Socialiste group. Since that time, Bataille
Socialiste has ceased to exist. The reason? Like the Austrian Red
Front, it had no clear program, no banner. Pivert has moved
further left and Zyromsky has had to solidarize himself with the
right, with Blum himself. Zyromsky now plays the perfidious role
of Stalinist social patriot within the SFIO.
Pivert has now built up another left group, but this too will not
last six months. It is composed of one element afraid of the
patriots and another afraid of the Bolshevik-Leninists. The group
calls itself "Revolutionary Left. "254 It is a little left, but it is not
yet revolutionary.
Q: What do you think of the Lovestoneite argument, which we

hear in the ILP, that the CPSU must still be a good party because
it exists in a workers' state?255
A: That is not a Marxian argument, that is metaphysics. If a

workers' state automatically produced a good government there
would be no need for a Communist Party within it. The fact is
that the CP as the government of the workers' state is not a
"thing in itself " but is subjected to the play of different historical
forces. It can deviate, degenerate, become a danger to the
existence of the workers' state. That is precisely what has
happened in Russia.
ADVICE ON CANADIAN FARMERS256
November 1935
How to Reach the Farmer?

Although the economic position of the E uropean peasant is
very different from that of the Canadian farmer, certain
important features remain the same. For instance, although I
have made no special study of Canadian politics, I am willing to
assert that the so-called farmer parties of the prairies-now in
retreat before Social Credit257-have this in common with
peasant p arties everywhere: they do not and cannot represent the
farmer if they are not connected with genuine revolutionary
proletarian organizations. E xamine their leadership and cau
cuses and tell me if they are not dominated by the petty
bourgeois, the wealthier farmers, the lawyers, teachers, and
storekeepers. E xamine their financial connections and see if they
do not lead directly to merchant capital.
Farmers a Compo site Cla s s

I t i s always this way; so-called "independent farmer parties"
are or become antifarmer. Farmers cannot maintain an indepen
dent party, because they are not a homogeneous class. Like
capitalism as a whole, they are a composite of different classes;
they are the protoplasm from which all classes derive. If the
exploited poor farmers are not connected with the workers'
parties they inevitably become connected with the bourgeois
parties, by a hierarchy at whose top sits finance capital.
It was this b asic truth which the Narodniks could not see, and
which necessitated the long struggle of the Bolsheviks against
them. It was and is the essence of Bolshevism to introduce the
class struggle into the peasantry. The crime of Stalinism was to
reintroduce the Narodnik illusion that the peasantry was a
homogeneous m ass, which could be politically unified. That
illusion is especially dangerous in the more advanced countries,
209
where there are more wealthy farmers directly connected with

town finance.
Reach the Farmer Through the Worker

How can we win the farmhand and poor farmer to the support
of the industrial worker? At the start, do not look for an
auditorium full of peasants. One must begin by explaining the
problems of the farmer to the workers. The revolutionary p arty
must first itself analyze the existing farmer parties and expose
the connections between their directive strata and their exploit
ers. It must not only understand and sympathize with the
farmers' troubles; it must point out to the lower layers the
centrifugal forces which forever shattered all efforts at a unified
and independent farmers' organization (i.e., independent from the
working class but therefore dependent on the bourgeoisie).
It is through its work in the mass proletarian organizations
that the revolutionary reaches the farmer. In Canada especially, I
am told, much of the population is in small towns where workers
and farmers live side by side. Here the contact actually takes
place; here is the opportunity to spread Bolshevik ideas, which
can unite the exploited lower strata of the farms with the main
historic fight of the proletariat. Through the workers we find the
way to the farmer.
Work with Women and the Youth

"Revolutionary" organiz ations which have no special place for
women and the youth are not revolutionary. In life, the m ain
burden falls on women. B oth women and youth are the most
exploited by the capitalists and the most misprized by reformists.
There is a tendency to regard the youth as less important
perhaps because they do not vote! It is this attitude to them as
well as to the colonial workers which is the test of the Bolshevik.
It should be remembered that the youth are asked to do most of
the fighting in the capitalists' wars. We must educate our best
youth comrades side by side with ourselves, especially in
Bolshevik theory.
Above all, the women! As the Social Democrats are the
aristocracy of the working class, working women, whether in
home or factory, are the lowest paid, the most driven, the most
exploited-they are the pariah s . And we-we are the party of the
most exploited. So we are therefore the party of women and the
youth.
Advice on Canadian Farmers 211
Illegal and Mass W ork

The centrist comes to the revolution with the idea that mass
work is prosaic but "underground" work romantic. The two tasks
must by s ynthesized-in fact, they are the same. Illegal work is
the work of remaining among the masses, not of retiring into a
cellar. The passing over from fraction work in revolutionary trade
unions to illegal work under war conditions is imperceptible. The
trade union bureaucracy becomes the police spy system-that is
all.
W hy Are There Still Honest Workers

in the Comintern after Germany?
Great historical defeats do not have their full meaning m ade
clear to the worker immediately. Only in revolutionary periods do
our ideas find an immediate reflection in the broad masses.
Thinking and analyzing are not taught to the masses by
capitalism. Not having that capacity, they must learn from
events, by slogans adequate to them and hammered in. It is the
fault of the sectarian that he does not understand this. He
becomes disgusted with the workers' movement given by history
and wants his own little workers' movement. Great defeats,
especially when they are caused by the b ankruptcy of their own
leadership, do not make the workers more revolutionary but
demoralize their organization for a long time. That is why,
although the Left Opposition in Russia predicted the Chinese
defeat that Stalinism caused, yet the defeat hurt the Left
Opposition and strengthened Stalin's bureaucracy in the Soviet
Union.
That is why there are still honest workers in the Comintern.
That is why we must explain the German defeat, patiently
explain. How could we expect that we, the left wing of the world
proletariat, who have suffered one defeat after another, could
have become in such a period stronger and more powerful? We
can and we will grow with the new awakening of the world
proletariat, and the Fourth International will provide the leader
ship.
REMARKS IN PASSING258
December 8, 1935
Dear Friend W:
I was very happy to receive some sign of life from you after
such a long silence. That you remain unbowed and ready to fight
despite all the shocks and difficult tests you have had to undergo
came as no surprise to me, but it greatly cheered me nonetheless
in these times when so many lose heart, adapt to reformism, or
stand on the sidelines under cover of a whole spectrum of
ultraradical critiques.
Comrades from the CP or the Zinoviev faction who are inclined
toward us, not a few of them politically talented individuals, do
not, unfortunately, find the right path and the right words so
easily. This theme is taken up at least in p art in the article
"Those Who Have Not Gotten Hold of Themselves" in the most
recent issue of Unser Wort. The leadership of the European
Communists (including the Zinovievists) were thrust all at once
into the "masses " -thanks to the war and the October Rev olu
tion. They then settled down to indolence and accustomed
themselves to "commanding" the masses with short, pithy
phrases. They thought that their power resided in themselves and
in their phrases. In actuality, their power resided in the
confidence of the awakening masses in the O ctober Revolution
and the Comintern-despite their false formulas. Hence many
elements from this layer are like the young wastrel who has
squandered his inheritance and is looking for some magic
formula that will fill his pockets again. The determined
preparatory and educational work of the revolutionary pioneer
doesn't appeal to them. Instead they are always looking not just
for our errors (of which there are, naturally, many) but for the
error which prevents the masses from rallying to them again en
masse. They know from the history books that Bolshevism
experienced not only periods of flood, but periods of ebb too (1906-
12, 1914-17), but they have never understood this politically. This
212
Remarks in Passing 213
is the reason for their constant vacillating, their tendency t o give

equal weight to what is secondary and what is essential in our
program and their propensity to listen to the SAP's philistine
gossip-and in fact not j ust to its gossip, but to its real
opportunistic critique as well.
A fresh example: Erde, who was supposed to assume responsi
bility for international aid to the internationalist parties, had a
falling out with the IS over secondary-although in practice
important-consideration s . I got the impression that the IS did
not really handle everything as it should have been handled.
Nevertheless (or rather, all the more), I viewed Erde's break with
the IS as absolutely wrong. I wrote him a letter to this effect. The
answer arrived a short time ago. Erde sets forth a whole number
of criticisms of the Bolshevik-Leninists, among which the
important ones are mixed in with the unimportant and no
general perspective emerges. The whole document is, however,
characterized by a hostile tone, directed not against me
personally, but against our international organization and
various individual comrades. There are two passages in this letter
that I find revealing: one has to do with the question of sanctions,
the other with the SAP.
Erde writes : "Since the working class is doing nothing, can do
nothing, and for the most part desires to do nothing, the
measures taken by the bourgeoisie must serve as the basis for a
campaign. Any kind of negative position serves fascism."
On this basis, Erde rej ects the position on sanctions taken by
our Italian comrades. What position does Comrade Erde himself
take toward the Stalinists and reformists? Since the proletariat is
weak at present, it m:ust . . . look to the bourgeoisie for support.
The weakness of the proletariat is in fact a result of allowing the
bourgeoisie to do as it likes . And, if this passivity toward one's
own imperialist government is raised to the level of a principle,
this serves not to strengthen the proletariat but only to
undermine the future of its vanguard.
Erde writes further: "How is it possible to make such a foolish
decision as the Dutch section's resolve to have nothing more to do
with the emigres who are members of the SAP? These SAP
comrades are our closest friends."
I don't think the Dutch section's decision is foolish; I think it is
beneficial. The American p arty also decided a short time ago to
break off all friendly relations with the SAP and the lAG. The
SAP is at present nothing more than the organized agency for all
the shortcomings and ambiguities of the leaderships and ex-
leaderships of the old organizations-for an underhanded,

slanderous, philistine attack on the Fourth International.
If Erde takes the above-mentioned positions on these two
questions-which are, moreover, closely related (sanctions and
the SAP, i.e., right opportunism)-what sense is there in wasting
time discussing the practical errors of the IS or the real or
imagined errors committed by Unser Wort? We are standing on
different sides of the barricades.
I don't know where Comrade Harte stands on sanctions and
"our closest friends," although at first he marched in step with
Erde. It is unlikely that he agrees with Erde. But, as I can tell
from his letters, he too is among the impatient ones, who just
yesterday "commanded" the masses and have not yet rid
themselves of this habit, which they can find no application for
in our ranks . Not just because we have no great masses to
command, but because the " small mass" that we are gathering
around us with increasing s uccess does not want to be "com
manded" after the Zinoviev-Stalin experience. That our young
comrades can use good advice is not to be disputed. That is why I
always placed special emphasis on attracting the best elements of
the older generation. But now some of them want to replace long
term educational work with the crack of the overseer's whip. This
will not do. For even the youngest among us have a feeling of
independence, acquired at great cost. And this feeling is what
makes it possible for them to resist the old organizations, with
their united front, their People's Front and all their other grand
gestures that impress the philistines so much.
You write that one comrade thinks I myself have already
reached the conclusion that the counterrevolution has completely
triumphed in the Soviet Union, but that I do not consider it
opportune to say so publicly. E ven if it was unintentional, this
comrade could not do me any greater insult. Saying what is has
always been our highest principle. Implying that I have two
opinions, one for myself (or for myself and my closest friends)
and the other for the outside world-that is really too much.
On the question of the historical analogy with Thermidor, I
recently undertook to correct myself publicly. 259 There it was a
question of nothing more than an analogy, which is always one
sided, never complete. I really can't add anything to what I've
said before as far as the essence of the matter is concerned.
Regarding the Soviet Union and the war, Comrade Braun will
give you a short formulation of my position, reduced to the barest
essentials. Can we work with comrades who are of another
Remarks in Passing 215
opinion on this decisive question? This question cannot be

answered with a simple yes or no. The Treint group in France
declares that they agree with us on all questions except that of
the social character of the Soviet Union, but for this reason they
will not sign the Open Letter. If however, some individual or
group j oins the Fourth International despite differences on the
Soviet Union-that means that either they feel quite sure of
themselves or else they underestimate the importance of this
question. In both cases it would be wrong to reject such comrades.
We should accept them in order to discuss further with them, on
the basis of events. I don't think a more precise answer to this
question can be given .
As for the question of the united front, I think that there is a
tendency to create great terminological confusion over this,
which makes it difficult to pose the question clearly. The concept
"united front" is closely linked with the well-known maxim:
march separately, but strike together. In order to strike together,
it is necessary to form a united front. It is thus not a question of a
permanent institution, but of a temporary battle formation. In
"quiet" times , the application of a united front would prove the
exception. In a revolutionary period, the united front can have an
extended character and even take on an organizational form (e.g.,
the form of revolutionary soviets). In any case, under all
circumstances, it is a question of closing ranks in order to strike
something that presupposes mass organizations.
Let's take, for example, the late "united front" between the ILP
and the British CPo This was a permanent alliance between
propaganda groups. That is not a united front but an open
admission that one of the two groups (or perhaps both) has no
claim to an independent political existence. They march together
even before they have succeeded in gathering the forces to strike.
One should march alone if one really has something to s ay to the
working class.
I am not sure whether these remarks made in passing apply to
the discussion you mentioned or whether they are thus useful for
clarifying the question. But you will be able to judge that better
than 1. In any case, we must be patient with all those groupings
that approach us even if they approach with airs of superiority
which are not totally j ustified. We should yield nothing in the
realm of principle, but we should not play prestige politics. We
should not allow ourselves to be influenced by unpleasant
memories and we should not lose our heads. This, I believe,
should be our rule. Even with the SAP people we exercised the
greatest patience for several years. That in this instance

reserving judgment proved to be no more than a reprieve is their
own fault. We must show goodwill toward every other group and
every individual, since we are the stronger. We have a tradition
behind us and no doubts whatever about our future.
Stay well, dear friend, and don't let life's misfortunes get you
down.
L. Trotsky
ON THE POSTCARD AMALGAM26 0
December 15, 1935
To the International Secretariat of the ICL
Dear Comrades :
1. Information from an absolutely reliable source indicates that
the GPU is continuing to develop the amalgam with Fred Zeller's
postcard internationally. Thus, the Central Committee of the
Norwegian CP has received orders from Moscow to keep T. and
his friends under surveillance, because they are preparing-you
understand-a terrorist attempt against (naturally) Stalin.
Furthermore, the CC was declared in advance to be responsible
for any disastrous consequences that might come of its possible
negligence. The purpose is clear. Moscow wants to receive
through this miserable CC information that can enable the GPU
to gather material for its work of provocation. The CC seemed
quite flabbergasted. It can be assumed that similar instructions
were given by the GPU to all the Central Committees of the so
called Communist International.
2. Fred Zeller explained the foolish postcard to me in a letter
just as I had explained it myself. It was only an enthusiastic
prank. One would have to be an absolute idiot to believe that by
means of a friendly and humorous postcard (in the style of the
Latin Quarter) to a young Stalinist, Fred Zeller sought to incite
him to penetrate the Kremlin in order to assassinate Stalin.
Nevertheless, I find the reaction of our comrades and friends
against the disgraceful acts of the hirelings of the GPU (Duclos
and Company) to be absolutely insufficient. Zeller's own
assessment ("the complete failure of Stalinist slander") is too
optimistic. The material means of the GPU are enormous. And
stupidity is an abundant resource. We must respond vigorously
and above all systematically.
3. It is necessary to create a special (nonpartisan) committee,
making use of the information brought to light by the Yugoslavs
217
[Taro v and Ciliga]. Cannot Souvarine be interested in this affair?

Perhaps also Rosmer, and even Magdeleine Paz.2 6 1 (But not
Raymond Molinier, who has his "ideas" on this question too, just
as confused and unrealistic as ever.2 6 2 In practice, he has already
sabotaged several campaigns against the amalgams). Zeller
could appeal to each of them.
The aim of the committee: to develop an international
campaign on behalf of the rev olutionary political prisoners,
beginning with Zinoviev and Kamenev, the two Yugoslavs, etc.
Some time ago I received a draft of an appeal concerning
Zinoviev and Kamenev, but without explanations. The text didn't
seem to me to be appropriate for its purposes (it had a long
digression on Plekhanov, etc.). But an appeal is not the answer.
What is needed is a committee that can develop a systematic
campaign.
4. I make the following suggestion to this committee: By
registered mail, Romain Rolland was sent my reply to his
insinuations in l'Humanite. Has he responded to it? Of course
not. I can thus accuse him of publishing criminal slanders
against Zinoviev, Kamenev, and others, and cite him before an
ethics commission. Is such a course possible? I believe it is.
Perhaps Marcel Martinet could be consulted about it, if he is not
too ill. (Perhaps Louzon as we11.)2 6 3 In any case, a public
accusation against Romain Rolland as a slanderer of defenseless
prisoners to me seems quite effective.
5 . To return to the subject of the celebrated postcard. Is it true
that the addressee was under GPU surveillance (and for what
reason?), and that his mail was stolen by means of a skeleton
key? (That is the familiar version around here.)
6. In Zeller's article ("Reply to Slanderers," in Revolution, no.
17), the following sentence occurs: "If L 'A vant-garde [the paper of
the French Stalinist youth] persists in its campaign, I may be
obliged to enlarge on this point." Nothing must be left to
speculation. It is necessary to persist even if L 'Avant-garde
doesn't: F. Zeller is obliged to reveal everything.
7. For my part, I could present the committee with a document
briefly summarizing my pamphlet on the Kirov affair (the
responsibility of Stalin and Yagoda for Kirov's assassination)
and on the further development of the amalgams.
I call your attention to the fact that at least a week before I
heard about this humorous postcard I wrote a pamphlet, at Fred
Zeller's urging, about why Stalin was victorious. I published the
article-as I invariably do-with a date (November 12, 1935), in
On the Pos tcard Amalgam 219
the most recent number of the Russian Biulleten, and ended it

with the affirmation that Stalinism as a system must collapse
under the pressure of the international revolutionary movement:
"We want and look forward to no other revenge." I believe that
this article should be published by Revolution with an introducto
ry note from the editors on the circumstances under which it was
written.264
8. There are some comrades who believe that it is more
important to repeat endlessly the same arguments for workers'
militias than to bother about the Stalinist amalgam. This is
wrong. You will not make any progress toward a militia without
discrediting Stalinism, which is today the best assistant to
fascism. Metallurgists say that phosphorus is the syphilis of iron.
We must understand and proclaim that Stalinism is the syphilis
of the workers' movement.
REQUEST F OR A MONTH'S
LEAVE OF ABSENCE265
December 27, 1935
It is absolutely necessary that I should get at least four weeks'

leave and should not be approached with any letters from the
sections .. . . Otherwise it will be impossible for me to recover my
capacity for work. These disgusting trivia not only rob me of my
ability to cope with more serious affairs, but give me insomnia,
fever, etc . . . . I request you to be quite ruthless about this. Then I
may perhaps be at your disposal again, say, by February 1.
220
FOR A LUCID EXPLANATION266
December 30, 1935
Comrade Vereecken:
You have not replied to my last letter. However, I asked you a
very specific question: What non-entrist groups do you support?
What are your international connections? We have the right to
ask you this: you know our international affiliations perfectly
well, while we do not know yours. Moreover, it is a matter of
common work according to your own suggestion.
As far as I can judge from here, the "POB chapter" of our
Belgian section is approaching its conclusion.267 We certainly
hope that our group will exit much stronger than it entered. From
the instant of the expulsions-which seem to be brought closer
again by Godefroid's perfidious treason-the question of the new
party must be posed. It must be prepared for. The ground must be
cleared by a lucid explanation. That was the purpose of my last
letter. I await your reply with the greatest interest.
With my best greetings,
L. Trotsky
221
DEVELOPMENTS IN THE USSR268
December 31, 1935
To all sections of the ICL and all sympathizing organizations:
In the recent period, comrades from various countries have

complained of a lack of general articles concerning the USSR. We
will take energetic steps to remedy this in the next period.
Comrade Markin [Leon Sedov] has been charged with establish
ing a special press service to deal with these questions.2 6 9 He has
already prepared a first article on the Stakhanovite movement.
The article is based on very important documentation and, in my
opinion, gives a totally correct picture of the character and the
role of this movement, which is glorified by the Stalinists not
only uncritically, but also in a totally dishonest fashion. I would
like to call the attention of all comrades to this article.270
Crux [Trotsky]
222
THE CLASS NATURE
OF THE SOVIET STATE271
January 1, 1936
Dear Comrades :
You ask whether the present Soviet system can give way to a
"third" form of society, which would be neither capitalist nor
socialist. Urbahns believes that this is in fact "state capitalism,"
identifying the Soviet system with a regimented fascist capital
ism.272 In doing this he completely overlooks a very subtle
difference: fascism hems in the highly developed productive
forces within the framework of the national state, in which it
checks their further development. The Soviet system, even in its
present form, imparts a tempo to the development of the
productive forces never before attained. Urbahns thus does not
know how to distinguish between what is historically progressive
and what is archreactionary.
I see that you have nothing in common with Urbahns's
formulation. But you think that the Soviet bureaucracy, in its
further development, might be able to adapt the forms of property
to its own interests to such a point that it would become in reality
a ruling class. You do not specify these new forms of property.
You content yourself with the general statement that living
evolution is inexhaustible in its new forms and formations.
In this general form, I find it as difficult to adopt as to rej ect
the "third" possibility, because too many factors must be
abstracted for that-in the first instance those that are decisive
for our revolutionary activity.
Now, property forms are social forms par excellence. You cite
examples-moreover, ones taken from the pre capitalist epoch
where certain forms of property had no great significance. These
examples only prove that it is necessary to distinguish the real
from the supposed forms of property, i.e., from juridical fictions
(which also have a real function, but on a higher plane). The
bourgeoisie has reduced property forms to their baldest expres-
223
sion. The proletarian revolution nationalized capitalist property.

The question therefore arises: cannot this nationalization itself
degenerate into a fiction, with real property, under one form or
another, returning to the new ruling class emerging from the
bureaucracy?
Nationalized property stands or falls with the planned
economy. Thus, it is not a fiction, but a powerful reality.
Nationalization, however, signifies that the productive forces are
organized and directed not only according to a plan, but also in
the interests of all. The bureaucracy hurts the new system in both
respects. On the one hand, it reduces the efficiency of the planned
economy, and on the other it consumes an enormous portion of its
surplus.
If we speak of a "third" system, we must answer the question
whether it is a matter of the rights newly acquired by the
bureaucracy to an ever larger part of the national income-which
would be equivalent to the right of parasitism-or if what is
involved is the virtual liquidation of the planned economy. Only
the second hypothesis would constitute a new social base.
We must clearly understand that the abolition of the plann ed
economy, and by the same token also the nationalization of the
productive forces, will inevitably and automatically lead to
paralysis and disintegration of the latter. We would then no
longer have before us a progressive system , but one in decomposi
tion , which would inevitably lead to fascist capitalism. It is
conceivable that a development so rich in possible formations
would create something original. But in the essence of the matter
there would be h ardly any change.
Let us suppose that the planned economy remains basically
intact, that the productive forces continue in their rise; then
there will remain-in your hypothesis-nothing but the fact that
the bureaucracy has succeeded in stabilizing, fortifying, and
eternalizing its parasitism , juridically, ideologically, and p oliti
cally (and why not religiously?). This perspective assumes that
the great mass of the population patiently accepts the new yoke
despite the rising level of the economy and culture and endures it
without offering any resistance, and forever. That is not at all
probable. At a certain stage, economic progress opens great
sources of power to the bureaucracy. But this very progress is
more and more working to the disadvantage of its autocracy and
its parasitism.
What perspective opens before us? Very probably a new
revolution. This will not be a social revolution, but a political
The Class Nature of the Soviet State 225
revolution. In its evolution the bourgeoisie too has known of

"great" revolutions, i.e., social revolutions, and purely political
revolutions which took place on the basis of already established
property. The theoretical prognoses of Marx and Lenin did not
foresee, in any case, the possibility of political revolutions on the
basis of property nationalized by the proletariat. But they did not
foresee the Bonapartist degeneration of the proletarian dictator
ship, either. B oth these things belong to those stages, transitory
forms, etc., in the formation of which history is so rich. The
general l aws of the evolution of capitalism to socialism, as they
are established by Marxism, do not lose their force by virtue of
these "episodes" (very disagreeable "episodes").
These are a few considerations on the subject of the interesting
problem you have posed to me-which I send you in all h aste.
With warmest greetings,
Yours,
L. Trotsky
FOREIGN COMMUNISTS IN D ANGER273
January 2, 1936
In the resolution of the last plenum of the Central Committee of

the CPSU (December 23, 1935) about the verification of party
documents, membership cards, etc., we find a very peculiar
indication that insufficient vigilance on the part of the party
bodies in question made it possible for foreign intelligence
agencies to smuggle their agents into the Communist Party under
the mask of political emigrants and foreign Communists.
This paragraph of the resolution demands the closest attention
and the greatest mistrust. It is of course not excluded that spies
might assume the mask of Stalinists and, in the thoroughly
bureaucratized inner-party life, do so with success. But one must
wonder why the Central Committee has considered it necessary
to make a big point of this in the resolution. Reai questions of
espionage are normally not dealt with in the open. A secret
memorandum about this question would be completely sufficient
for party bodies. But the fact that it is considered useful to report
the infiltration of foreign spies to the public so demonstratively
proves that this maneuver is intended to solve a completely
different and much more important problem.
In the last few years hundreds of foreign Communists were
insidiously coaxed into the Soviet Union, arrested, and put into
concentration camps or solitary confinement, or deported. Dozens
of them were executed. They tried to link up the assassination of
an important group of foreign Oppositionists with the Kirov
affair. Now they are trying to give a more general and longer
lasting pretext for the extermination of critical-minded foreign
ers . It is very likely that the creators of the amalgam (in the first
instance the pair Stalin and Yagoda) are very concerned about
the revelations of the Yugoslavian comrade Ciliga, since his
release.2 7 4 And they are right. Therefore they try to furnish the
foreign agents of the GPU (including Messrs. Stalinist editors)
with a ready-made formula for deceiving public opinion. Since the
226
Foreign Communists in Danger 227
whole world could not be implicated in Kirov's assassination,

suspicion can be thrown on the others by calling them spies.
It will not help. The workers will demand the institution of an
impartial international commission, to investigate all charges,
persecutions, and assassinations of foreign Communists. This
slogan has now acquired enormous importance for purging the
workers' movement of the poison of the Stalinist amalgam.
NOTES OF A JOURNALIST275
January 10, 1936
Uruguay and the USSR
Uruguay has broken off diplomatic relations with the USSR.

This step was indubitably taken under the pressure of Brazil and
other Latin American countries, possibly the United States as
well, as a type of "warning." In other words, the rupture of
diplomatic relations is an act of imperialist provocation. It has no
other meaning. So far as financial assistance of the Communist
International to the Latin American revolutionists is concerned,
diplomatic organs are not at all needed for this purpose: there are
dozens of other ways and means. We are not speaking here of the
fact that the intervention of the Comintern into revolutionary
movements has invariably led and leads to their shipwreck, so
that the bourgeois governments, in all conscience, should not
complain of the leaders of that institution but on the contrary
bestow upon them the highest decoration-of course, not the
"Lenin medal," but, s ay, the "Stalin medal."
But this aspect of the case does not interest us now. The
conduct of the Soviet press does. It would be difficult to imagine a
more repulsive spectacle! Instead of directing the thunder of its
completely justified indignation against the all-powerful inspirers
of Uruguayan reaction, the Soviet press is absorbed in insipid
and idiotic mockery of Uruguay's small territory, its numerically
small population and its weakness. In the brazen and thoroughly
reactionary verses of Demyan Bedny, 2 76 we find retailed his
inability to find Uruguay on the maps without the aid of glasses,
and his recalling, in this connection, how the Uruguayan consul
complained helplessly about the seizure of his automobile by the
Bolsheviks during the October Revolution. In so doing, this poet
laureate retails the consul's speech with all sorts of "national"
accents, entirely in the spirit of the Black Hundred witticisms of
the czarist official organs No uoye Vremya and Kieulyanin (it is
rumored, incidentally, that Demyan Bedny began his literary
career precisely on the Kieulyanin).277 It is true that during the
228
Notes of a Journalist 229
days of the October Revolution the workers and Red Guards

seized the automobiles of Messrs. Diplomats; it was necessary to
disarm the class enemy since all the diplomats sided with the
counterrevolution. Suffice it to recall that Kerensky fled from
Petrograd under cover of an American flag.2 78 But after the
victory, when all sorts of complaints were investigated, the
diplomats of the small and weak countries met with considerably
greater attention and kindliness on the part of the Soviet
government than did those of the big brigands. And, in any case,
had anyone in those days attempted to indulge in the mockery of
a "national" accent, he would have been thrown into the nearest
garbage can.
It is otherwise today. Stalin and Litvinov prance on their hind
legs before Mussolini and Laval. How abject was the tone in
which Moscow conversed with Hitler immediately after the
latter's assumption of power! But, in return, they permit
themselves to wreak their entire all-supreme splendor upon the
head of "tiny," "insignificant," "not-to-be-noticed-on-the-map"
Uruguay. As if involved here was a question of the size of the
country, the numerical strength of the population, and not the
question of state policy! In "trifles" of this sort the reactionary
spirit of the ruling bureaucracy expresses itself more obviously,
perhaps, than it does in its general policies.
Let us recall another episode. On the day of the arrival of the
English minister Eden in Moscow, the party newspaper in
Mogilev printed an article on the subject of the hypocrisy of
British politics.2 7 9 Pravda flew into indignation: "Would anyone
require a greater proof of political obtuseness?" To write about
the hypocrisy of British diplomacy is . . . to reveal obtuseness;
but it is entirely permissible to engage in obscurantist and
chauvinist pornography in relation to the people of Uruguay
yes, the people, for-let it be known to the sycophants of
Pravda-the language, the territory, and the numerical strength
of the population of a country pertain to the people and not to the
government.
P.S.-As if this were not incredible enough, Molotov referred in

his report to the Central Executive Committee to the shameful
work of Demyan Bedny as the expressed governmental position
on the rupture of diplomatic relations with Uruguay. On this
chauvinist pornography is thus placed the official stamp of the
Stalinist government. To b ackslide like this is to backslide all the
way.
Torgler and Maria Reese280

In December 1935, the press of the Comintern made public the
expulsion of Torgler from the [German Communist] party for his
"unworthy conduct at the [Reichstag fire] trial." It is obvious that
the Comintern, like many other diseased organisms, is distin
guished by an extreme lag in reflexes_ Two years h ave already
elapsed since the Dimitrov-Torgler trial. During this time the
Comintern has succeeded in expelling thousands of Communists
who questioned the correctness of the social-patriotic turn, or the
Marxian quality of the "People's Front_" In Torgler's case, they
took their time: evidently, some hope was cherished that use
might still be made of this cowardly petty bourgeois_ Dimitrov
was transformed into a semidivinity, while Torgler was passed
over in polite silence_ A genuine revolutionary organization
would have briefly taken note of Dimitrov's courageous conduct
as something that is taken for granted, and would have
immediately expelled Torgler_ However, the Comintern has long
since lost the normal revolutionary reflexes _ _ _ _
As a matter of fact, Torgler was expelled not for his already
half-forgotten conduct at the trial, but for his completely going
over to the camp of N azism_ According to the dispatch in Pravda,
Torgler has not only been freed from the concentration camp but
is at work together with Maria Reese "on some sort of book." If
that is the case, then there can be no doubts whatever on the
matter, because Maria Reese has long since sold herself to the
Ministry of Nazi Propaganda_
Moscow Pravda (December 27, 1 935) underscores the fact that
Reese went "from Trotsky to Hitler." For once in a blue moon,
there is an iota of truth in this assertion, namely, that Maria
Reese, who played a big role in the Stalinist party before selling
herself to Goebbels, did actually attempt to worm her way into
the organization of the Bolshevik-Leninists.2 8 1 Very soon, how
ever, it became apparent that this individual belongs to that
type, now reigning in the apparatus of the Comintern, which
looks upon the workers' movement as a source of influence and
income. It was precisely because of this that she was unable to
maintain herself in our midst-not for years, as she did in the
midst of the Stalinists, but for more than a few months, in reality
a few weeks.
But what about Torgler? He was no accidental figure. He was
the chairman of the Reichstag fraction of the CP! And he, in any
case, went to Hitler directly from Stalin, without first feeling out
the Bolshevik-Leninists. On this particular "adventure" Pravda
keeps mum. Yet the ranks of the Stalinist bureaucracy in all
countries are filled with similar Torglers and Reeses. They are
ready for any and all turns-provided two conditions are
guaranteed: first, that their own skins be in no way endangered
thereby; second, that they be paid for the turns in stable currency.
Everything else is of no importance to them. It is not difficult to
foresee that in the ominous events impending in Europe the
apparatus of the Comintern will be the sower of renegacy.
"Socialist Culture"?
At the Kremlin conference of the Stakhanovists the director of
the Gorky automotive plant, one Dyakonov, spoke cautiously and
discreetly of the possibility of completing the five year plan in
four years. Ordzhonikidze heckled him every time he made a
statement, not only with questions, but urging him on with j eers
and inappropriate witticisms. 282 It is not difficult to picture to
oneself the position in which the modest reporter was placed by
these majestic wisecracks in the luxurious hall of the Kremlin
palace. Dyakonov even permitted himself to remark, "Comrade
Sergo, I would like to answer your questions, but you don't give
me the time." However, Ordzhonikidze was not to be deterred.
According to the newspaper account he interrupted Dyakonov's
very brief report no less than fourteen times, in addition to which
he spoke throughout to the director of the factory, i.e., one of his
inferiors, using the familiar form of address. 2 8 3 Is it that they are
merely old chums ? No. Dyakonov replies to his superior, always
in a respectful tone, always addressing him not as "thou" but as
"you." . . .
At the conference a great deal was said on the subject of a
cultural attitude toward labor and toward people. But
Ordzhonikidze-and he was not the only one-deported himself
after the manner of the true-bred Russian industrial feudalist of
the good old days, who jovially mocks his inferiors in the familiar
"Hey, you there! " style. It is not difficult to imagine how Lenin
would have reacted to such grandee manners! He was organically
incapable of tolerating brazenness and vulgarity, all the more so
in relation to a subordinate, younger comrade who can be easily
rattled on the platform.
Incidentally, Ordzhonikidze deigned to mock Dyakonov quite
benignly; but his tone clearly conveyed that he was very well able
to deport himself otherwise. One cannot but recall in this

connection an incident that occurred in 1923, when Ordzhoni
kidze, in the role of first dignitary of the Trans-Caucasian
district, slapped a younger comrade in the face because the latter
had dared to contradict him. Lenin on his sickbed gathered all
the facts relating to this abomination and proposed that the
Central Committee immediately remove Ordzhonikidze from all
responsible posts and expel him from the party for two years. It
was precisely this proposal that sealed the alliance between
Ordzhonikidze and Stalin. But today, in the struggle for socialist
"culture," Ordzhonikidze does not have to restrain himself. . . .
It ought to be said that K aganovich does all he can not to be
outstripped by Ordzhonikidze. Not for nothing are they both
"beloved people's commissars . " Kaganovich also addressed the
railway machinists who spoke at the conference familiarly,
entirely in the manner of a general addressing his orderly in the
good old days. Kaganovich does it, if anything, more repulsively
than Ordzhonikidze.
And Pravda, the central organ of the Communist (!?!) Party,
prints these exemplars of grandee vulgarity so that all may learn
and emulate.
Byzantinism
On November 17, in the Kremlin, during the Stakhanovist
conference, Voroshilov spoke of pilots "who m aster completely, in
a real way, in a Stalinist way, the technique of aviation" (Pravda,
November 20, 1935).284 Thus we suddenly learn that Stalin, in his
perfection, is a master of aviation technique.
The said Voroshilov stated during the same speech: " Stalin,
who has studied the question of arming the army in its full scope
. . . has said more than once that tanks, airplanes, cannons-all
these are not soap, not m atches, not pastry, these are means of
defense, and therefore be so kind as to carry on the work as it
should be carried on." We learn that it is permissible to carry on
the work of m aking matches and soap not "as it should be," but
in any way at all. Such talk is commonly k nown as "excessive
zeal"!
It is quite comprehensible that Stalin should occupy himself
with a close study of arming the army. But take Mikoyan, for
example.285 Mikoyan, drawing profounder conclusions than
Voroshilov, related at the same conference the following
instructive anecdote. The Soviet plants produce for export
"excellent candies, Cologne water, bologna," etc., whereas the

same stuffs of absolutely rotten quality are supplied for domestic
consumption (we have j ust heard from Voroshilov that this is
entirely permissible with reference to matches, soap, and p astry).
Stalin, it turns out, gave Mikoyan a piece of advice: fool the
workers by telling them that the goods are allegedly manufac
tured for export, and then place them in circulation on the
domestic market. One is at a loss what to marvel at in the
dignitary's anecdote: the contempt toward the Soviet consumer,
or Stalin's resourcefulness, or Mikoyan's excessive zeal.
But the s aid Mikoyan went much further. It turns out that
when Mikoyan issued " an order to reestablish all the best grades
of soap," Stalin was not s atisfied with this and he in turn issued
an order (to Mikoyan!) to bring samples of toilet soap to a session
of the Political Bureau. As a result, the faithful Mikoyan relates,
"we received a special decision of the Central Committee . . . on
the assortment and formulas of soap." Thus Stalin turns out to be
not only an aviator but a skilled soap-maker.
This is the spirit, with a greater or lesser admixture of
Mikoyanism, in which all speeches at the conference were
delivered. The entire atmosphere is permeated through and
through with the spirit of intolerable Byzantinism. No, gentle
men, the country cannot and will not long breathe in such an
atmosphere! . . .
A Chance Admission
Sarkisov, secretary of the Donets Basin, in his report on the
Stakhanovist movement at a session of the CEC, provided two
remarkable master strokes. According to him, the Stakhanovists
themselves ought to write in the newspapers about Stakhano
vism; "it comes out more clearly and simply, and another worker,
reading this learns that there actually exists such a man. "
Moloto v: "Correct."
In these chance words there is revealed an annihilating truth:
the readers one and all do not believe the offical press; the
workers do not doubt that the bureaucrats manufacture not only
mythical statistics but also individuals. It is necessary to seek
special means in order to compel workers to believe that "there
actually exists such a m an . " Such, we might remark, is one of the
tasks of these solemn conferences of Stakhanovists in the
Kremlin, these publications of photographs, etc.
The same Sarkisov adduced the following example of the rise in
the productivity of labor in the coal mines: "A single driver is

capable of taking care of two horses." In addition to raising the
productivity of labor, said he, there is an added benefit, in that
"the horses can rest." The driver, in any case, does not have to
take a rest: the sweaty horse rests for him.
And Who Are the Judges?

Dimitri Sverchkov participated, as a Menshevik, in the
Petrograd Soviet in the year 1 905. As a right-wing Menshevik he
was the courier for Avksentiev, minister of the interior under
Kerensky. He took refuge from the October Revolution in White
Guard Kuban, and thundered against the Bolsheviks in the local
press there. After the Caucasus were cleaned up by the Red Army,
Sverchkov safely j oined the Bolsheviks. In 1922 he wrote a book,
A t the Dawn of the Revolution, in which, from his personal
recollections, he reconstructed the period of the 1 905 Soviet. This
snappily written volume went through several editions. But in
view of the fact that this book retails facts and not the latest
fictions, it does not fill the bill today. On D ecember 12, 1935,
Pravda carried a wild notice about this old book, which allegedly
"glorifies Trotsky." In the meantime the said Dimitri Sverchkov
has made a career for himself: today he is a member of the
Supreme Court of the USSR. The hapless author immediately
recognized the appraisal of his book to be "correct," via a letter to
the editors of Pra vda. To be sure! In 1922 Sverchkov's memory
was temporarily impaired due to terrific personal experiences, but
in 1935 he was completely restored to balance. In a newspaper
article written on the occasion of the anniversary of the first
soviet, Sverchkov supplies "recollections" of precisely the
opposite nature to those he provided thirteen years ago in his
book!
Such is the stuff Messrs. Judges are made of. Some of them, it
may be, will in time have to take their seats on the witness chair
as defendants . . . most probably to answer charges of sycho
phancy, perjury, and other manifestations of human base
ness . . . .
ON THE SOVIET SECTION OF
THE FOURTH INTERNATIONAL286
January 11, 1936
A new purge is being concluded in the so-called Communist

Party of the Soviet Union. This time it bears the modest label of a
"checkup on party credentials." The difference b etween this
purge and all those that preceded it lies in the fact that it is being
effected without even the nominal participation of the party
itself; no general meetings, no personal confessions, no public
denunciations, no corroborating testimony. The checking ma
chinery operates entirely behind the scenes: for, you see, this is
merely a matter of "credentials. " In reality approximately 10
percent of the party has been expelled as a result of this modest
technical checkup. The checkup of party candidates has not been
completed as yet. But already, many more than 200,000 have
been ejected from the ranks of the party. Let us recall,
incidentally, that this was almost the numerical strength of the
entire Bolshevik Party during the period when it led the
proletariat to the conquest of power.
The January 2 issue of Pravda breaks down the figures of the
expelled into the following main categories: "From Trotskyists,
Zinovievists, opportunists , double-dealers, alien elements, swin
dlers, adventurers, down to spies of the foreign agencies." The list
you will observe, reproduces the general formula of all Thermido
rean amalgams. It would be utterly n aive to become "indignant"
over the coupling of Trotskyists with swindlers and spies. Every
regime at loggerheads with the people persecutes, on the one
hand, revolutionists, and on the other, criminals. From time
immemorial these two categories lived side by side in the prisons
of the czar, as they live today in the prisons of the bourgeoisie of
the entire world. Kerensky in his own time swore again and
again that the Bolsheviks were in collusion with Black Hundred
gangs and German spies. Stalin remains entirely true to
tradition. Instead of growing "indignant" over the statistical
amalgam, let us analyze it more closely.
235
First of all we note the striking fact that from among the more
than 200,000 expelled, the "Trotskyists" are officially assigned
the first place. Does this imply that they are so large a group
numerically? Or is it that the bureaucracy, after liquidating "the
remnants and splinters" of Trotskyists no less than ten times,
still continues to consider them as its most dangerous enemy?
Both. We shall shortly prove on the b asis of official statistics that
the number of the expelled Bolshevik-Leninists during the last
purge alone (the latter part of 1935) amounted to no fewer than
1 0 ,000, and, in effect, a great many more. The bestiality of the
repressions is ample indication of the extent to which the
bureaucracy fears this "category."
The Trotskyists and Zinovievists are commonly lumped
together in a single category by the official accounts. The
Zinovievists always represented a purely Leningrad grouping; in
other parts of the country they consisted of only scattered
individuals, and, aside from their instability, they never had an
independent political character. Thus we obtain six categories of
the expelled: (1) Bolshevik-Leninists; (2) Zinovievists; (3) "oppor
tunists" (recorded here more for symmetry and camouflage: the
individual reports do not mention them at all as a rule);
(4) double-dealers and alien elements (former White Guards, etc.);
(5) swindlers and adventurists; (6) foreign spies. With slight
variations these categories are repeated in the district reports,
correspondence, leading articles, etc.
Before passing to the analysis of the numerical strength of the
Bolshevik-Leninists, we wish to point out that not one single
listing of the categories of the expelled, or any of the commentar
ies we have examined, contains any mention either of Menshe
viks or of Social Revolutionaries. Both these parties are
politically nonexistent. Their reactionary policy in 1 9 1 7, as
Comrade Tarov has recently so correctly pointed out, has barred
them from all approach to the new generations in the city and
countryside. And as the Yugoslav comrade Ciliga, yesterday's
captive of Stalin, has stressed on several occasions, the only
serious opposition in the country is that of the Bolshevik
Leninists. In other words, the opposition to Bonapartism in the
Soviet Union flows not from the principles of petty-bourgeois
democracy but from the conquests of the October Revolution, and
marches under its banner. Let us keep this fact firmly in mind,
for it is of colossal importance for the future.
Mter all the preceding purges and campaigns of physical

extermination it seems almost incredible that among the various
On the Soviet Section of the FI 237
categories of the expelled-not hundreds, not thousands, but a

minimum of 200,000-the Bolshevik-Leninists should be listed in
the first place. How many of them were there? The Soviet press
refrains cautiously from citing any totals on this score. Only in
individual articles and remarks dealing with provinces and
districts do we run across direct or indirect (most often indirect)
mention of the number of the expelled "Trotskyists." This is the
data we propose to dwell upon.
Khataevich, secretary of the Dneper-Petrovsk province, reports
in his article that during the checking of the documents in his
satrapy, 2,646 people were expelled from the party-8 percent of
the entire organization. During the checkup, it appears that "we
succeeded in uncovering not only isolated individuals but entire
counterrevolutionary Trotskyist-Zino vievist groups skulking in
the ranks of the party." Khataevich does not supply their
number. But he does cite other figures: " 1,500 White Guards,
kulaks, members of Petlyura, Makhno, and other bands; 300
frauds and swindlers who wormed their way into the party with
forged documents" (Pravda, December 26, 1935). These two
groups together comprise 1 ,800. In addition, the article also refers
obscurely to "foreign spies who penetrated into the party"; but
here the reference can only be to individuals, not more than a
score at the most. Subtracting the above-mentioned categories,
there remains to the share of Trotskyists and Zinovievists, as
well as oppositionists of all types, not less than 1,600. Or is
Khataevich perhaps hiding some other categories of the expelled?
Which ones? Why? But even if only a half or a third of the above
number falls to the share of the "Trotskyists," even then we get a
very imposing number (500 to 1 ,000). Naturally, this number is
still purely hypothetical in character.
In the same issue of Pravda, in a small item, we find that in the
Asov-Black Sea region, 4,324 people were expelled, 7 percent of
the total number checked. The checkup revealed that "in several
city organizations there existed counterrevolutionary Trotskyist
Zinovievist groups (the 'Krasny Aksai' plant, the regional
agricultural department, the fruit and grape trust)." This brief
item does not state what proportion of the expelled these groups
composed, but it does admit that even after the checkup
"unexposed enemies" continue to crop up in the regional
organizations.
In the West Siberian region, 3,576 members of the party were
expelled (11 percent) and 1 ,935 candidates (12.8 percent).
Secretary Eikhe writes in Pravda: "Among the expelled, the
largest number are kulaks and White Guards from Kolchak's
armies-these constitute almost a third. Then come the Trotsky

ists and Zinovievis ts . . . " (December 23, 1935). According to this
statement, the Bolshevik-Leninists take the second place numeri
cally. All the expelled, with the exception of the White Guards,
fall into not more than four categories. If the expelled were
divided equally among these categories, each would number more
than 900. Yet Eikhe himself states that the Trotskyists and
Zinovievists comprise the largest groups numerically, after the
White Guards. Therefore, there cannot be less than 1 ,000 expelled
Bolshevik-Leninists in the West Siberian region alone, or
approximately 20 percent of all those expelled. Says Eikhe,
"From the total number of Trotskyists and Zinovievists expelled
from the party about one-half worked in the educational
institutions. . . . The Trotskyist-Zinovievist garbage (!) took
particular pains to pervade the ideological sector, seeking to
utilize it for propaganda." The reference here is obviously to new
party members, from the student working class youth. We may
grant that Siberia is an exception as regards the high percentage
of Bolshevik-Leninists: the youth is obviously being subjected to
the influence of the exiles (the same phenomenon, we might add,
was to be observed under czarism as well.)
In the Kharkov district, out of 50,000 members, more than 4,000
were expelled. Secretary Zaitsev breaks down into categories only
2,356 cases of expulsion, checked by the highest bodies. Among
these are: 907 kulaks and White Guards; 594 moral degenerates
and breakers of discipline; 120 frauds and swindlers; 42 bourgeois
nationalists; and, finally, 120 Trotskyists. This time we are given
quite a definite figure, and, moreover, without any mention of
Zinovievists. If we take into consideration the fact that in
Kharkov, the satrapy of S. Kosior, Petrovsky, and Company, the
physical extermination of the Opposition has been going on since
1923, with a bestial ruthlessness so thorough that its fame has
spread throughout the entire Soviet Union, then even the modest
number of 120, comprising more than 5 percent of the expelled
(2,356), seems truly astounding.2 87
It is all too clear that the bureaucracy has not and cannot have
the slightest motives for exaggerating the influence of the
Bolshevik-Leninists. That is why we must look upon the figures
that have seeped into the press as the minimum. Moreover, since
1924 the Stalinist clique has preferred to expel Oppositionists as
"moral degenerates" and even as "White Guards. " There can be
no doubt that precisely the most influential and active Bolshevik
Leninists were expelled under these very categories: it is all the
On the Soviet Section of the FI 239
easier to make short shrift of them in the concentration camps or

en route to exile.
If we take the West Siberia coefficient, then we would arrive at
a number of not less then 40,000 expelled "Trotskyists" and
Zinovievists for the entire Soviet Union. We have already stated
why this number must be considered as too large. But even if we
take the deliberately minimized Kharkov percentage of the
expelled "Trotskyists," i.e., over 5 percent, then, out of the 200,000
expelled, we would get more than 10,000. If, finally, we take the
average between the West Siberian and Kharkov figures, then we
get 25,000. In all probability the latter number would be closer to
the truth.
The enormous political significance of the above data is clear
enough to anyone. One question remains: Why does the
bureaucracy, on the one hand, keep the total secret, while, on the
other, it makes public partial data which is sufficiently clear for
general orientation? The answer is very simple: the bureaucracy
crawls out of its skin to avoid giving publicity to the Bolshevik
Leninists, while at the same time it is compelled to broadcast a
warning: Beware! "They" are many! "They" are growing! In any
case, there is no longer any talk about "remnants" and "handfuls
still to be crushed."
The Bolshevik-Leninists were and remain the most irreconcil
able enemies of the bureaucracy, which seeks to perpetuate its
position as a ruling caste. Small wonder that the Stalinist clique
assigns the first place in its amalgam lists to the "Trotskyists."
They have earned the honor by their entire struggle. The very
nature of the most recent purge testifies in the best and clearest
possible way to the growth of their influence. The bureaucracy
can no longer make short shrift of its enemies by means of the
terrorized party, or even publicly before its eyes. The public purge
has been replaced by a star chamber, i.e., it is transferred entirely
into the hands of the GPU. Of course, the expelled, too, are placed
in the same hands-for physical extermination. This method is so
well adapted to the interests of the bureaucracy that Stalin has
immediately projected a new purge: from February 1 to May 1 of
the current year. Old party cards (these, it appears, have become
"tattered") must be exchanged for new ones, and the instructions
of the CC contain a rigid proviso that during the replacement of
party cards the secretaries, i.e., the organs of the GPU, must once
again check the entire party personnel and issue new cards only
to those who have earned "confidence." Perhaps six months later
we shall learn how many new Bolshevik-Leninists will thereby be
promoted from the party to the concentration camps.
The above-cited data may perhaps appear utterly unexpected to

many. We have purposely done all our computations before the
reader's eyes so as to exclude the possibility of any suspicions of
subj ectivism or bias on our part. The whole gist of the m atter lies
in the fact that under the influence of the Stalinist press and its
agents (like Louis Fisher and similar gentlemen)288 not only our
enemies but also many of our friends in the West have
imperceptibly become accustomed to the idea that if any
Bolshevik-Leninists still exist in the USSR, then they are almost
all in hard labor camps . No! That is not the case at all! The
Marxist program and the great revolutionary tradition cannot be
rooted out by means of police measures. To be sure, in the USSR
the Bolsheviks find it harder to work today than in any other
country in the world (of greatest interest in this respect is the
fresh testimony of the Yugoslav comrade Ciliga). Nevertheless,
the functioning of the revolutionary mind is not suspended for a
single day. If not as a doctrine, then as a mood, as a tradition, as
a banner, our tendency has a mass character in the USSR, and
today it is obviously drawing to itself new and fresh forces.
Among the ten to twenty thousand "Trotskyists" expelled during
the last months of 1935, the representatives of the older
generation, the participants in the movement of the years 1923-
28, comprise tens, perhaps hundreds, but not more. The basic
mass-all are the new recruits. Moreover, we must not forget that
the above data applies only to the party. But there also exists the
Communist Youth League, with its millions of youth! It is
precisely among them that unrest assumes a particularly
aggravated character. It is frightfully difficult for young
revolutionists to learn Leninism in the USSR. But without any
doubt their level is incomparably higher than the level of the
Stalinist "party . " The great tradition lives on. In secret places
lies hidden the old Oppositionist literature. On the shelves stand
the books of Marx, Engels, and Lenin (they dare not proscribe
them as yet) . The Soviet papers are compelled to publish news of
events in the entire world. The international literature under the
banner of the Fourth International is already a very rich one
today. Our ideas and slogans penetrate into the Soviet Union
through a thousand channels-in part, through our Russian
Biulleten. Thus the precious primacy of revolutionary thought is
being made secure.
Under the lash of the bureaucracy, and not without direct
provocation on the part of the Yagodas, Medveds, and others,289
isolated elements of the youth take the path of individual terror,
i.e., the path of despair and hopelessness. The B onapartists
On the So viet Section of the FI 241
avidly seize upon terrorist acts in order to justify their bloody

repressions of the Opposition: this m ethod is as ancient as the
ancient baseness of privileged despots . But the main section of
the revolutionary youth does not tear loose from its class to take
to the road of individualistic adventures. The program of the
Fourth International, even though it does not promise instan
taneous miracles , does point to the only correct and uncondition
ally certain way. The growth of the Fourth International on the
world arena strengthens and inspires our friends and followers in
the USSR. We can state with certainty that despite the thirteen
years of hounding, slander, and pogroms, unsurpassed either in
vileness or cruelty; despite capitulations and betrayals, more
dangerous than the persecutions; even today the Fourth Interna
tional already has its s trongest, numerically largest, and most
tempered section in the USSR.
No, we have not the slightest grounds for falling into apathy.
Progress is neither smooth nor straight. The struggle of the
oppressed demands great sacrifices. But the future is ours. The
latest bureaucratic purge in the USSR is proof even to the blind:
the f uture is ours!
P . S .-Insistent m ention of "spies of foreign agencies" expelled

from the party during the purge deserves particular attention.
Such cases are of course entirely possible. But by their very
nature, they can only be rare exceptions. An ordinary secret
circular letter would h ave sufficed to take care of forwarding the
information. But why do the newspapers keep harping about
spies? The Stalinist press could never have presumed to be so
bold without special instructions from above. But what is the
purpose of the issued order? It can be correctly divined.
During the years of Stalinist autocratic rule in the USSR not a
few foreign Communist-Oppositionists have been shot. A far
greater number are languishing in s olitary confinement, concen
tration camps, and exile. Ever m ore news about this is
penetrating abroad. Of exceptional value are the reports of A.
Ciliga, who recently tore free from the Stalinist chains . The
bureaucracy must in some way parry these revelations, by
arming its foreign lackeys with at least some semblance of an
explanation. There would be nothing astonishing were the agents
of the Comintern to proclaim all the foreign Communists shot
and arrested in the USSR as "spies of foreign agencies . " These
villainies, however, will not pass s cot-free. The working masses
will hear the truth. The organizations of the Fourth International
will be at their posts.
BOURGEOIS DEMOCRACY AND
THE FIGHT AGAINST FASCISM290
January 13, 1936
Dear Friend:
The question of our attitude toward governmental measures
ostensibly aimed against fascism is highly important.
Since bourgeois democracy is historically bankrupt, it is no
longer in a position to defend itself on its own ground against its
enemies on the right and the left. That is, in order to "maintain"
itself, the democratic regime must progressively liquidate itself
through emergency laws and administrative arbitrariness. This
self-liquidation of democracy in the struggle against right and
left brings to the fore the Bonapartism of degeneration, which
needs both the left and the right danger for its uncertain
existence in order to play them off against one another and to
progressively raise itself above society and its parliamentarism.
The Colijn regime has seemed to me for a long time to be a
potentially Bonapartist regime.
In this highly critical period, the main enemy of Bonapartism
remains , of course, the revolutionary wing of the proletariat.
Thus, we can say with absolute assurance that as the class
struggle deepens all emergency laws, extraordinary powers, etc.,
will be used against the proletariat.
Mter the French Stalinists and Socialists voted for the
administrative disbanding of paramilitary organizations, that
old scoundrel Marcel Cachin wrote in l 'Humanite approximately
as follows: "A great victory . . . . N aturally, we know that in
capitalist society all laws can be used against the proletariat. But
we will strive to prevent this, etc." The lie here is the word "can."
What should have been said was: "We know that as the social
crisis deepens, all these measures will be used against the
proletariat with tenfold intensity. " There is a simple conclusion
to be drawn from this: We cannot help build up the Bonapartism
of degeneration with our own hands and supply it with the
chains it will inevitably use to bind the proletarian vanguard.
242
Bourgeois Democracy and the Fight Against Fascism 243
This is not to say that for the immediate future Colijn will not
want to free his right elbow from the excessive presumptuousness
of the fascists. The social revolution in Holland does not seem to
be an immediate threat. Big capital hopes to allay the threaten
ing dangers by using the strong, concentrated (i.e., Bonapartist,
or semi-Bonapartist) state. But to keep the real enemy, the
revolutionary proletariat, within bounds, Colijn will never com
pletely eliminate or even sidetrack fascism. At most he will
simply keep it in check. That is why the slogan for the disband
ing and disarming of the fascist gangs by the state (and voting
for similar measures) is reactionary through and through (the
German Social Democrats cry: "The state must act!"). This would
mean making a whip out of the proletariat's hide, one which the
Bonapartist arbiters might use to softly caress the fascist rear
ends here and there. But it is our inescapable responsibility and
duty to protect the hide of the working class, not to hand over the
whip to fascism.
There is another aspect of the same situation which seems even
more important. Bourgeois democracy is a sham by its very
essence. The more it flowers, the less it can be utilized by the
proletariat (see the history of England and the United States).
But the dialectic of history commands that bourgeois democracy
can become a powerful reality for the proletariat at the very time
when it is falling apart. Fascism is the outward sign of this
degeneration.
The struggle against fascism, the defense of the positions the
working class has won within the framework of degenerating
democracy can become a powerful reality since it gives the
working class the opportunity to prepare itself for the sharpest
struggles and partially to arm itself. The last two years in
France, since February 6, 1 934, h ave given the workers'
organizations an excellent opportunity (and perhaps one that will
not so soon be repeated) to mobilize the proletariat and the petty
bourgeoisie on the side of the revolution, to create a workers'
militia, etc. This precious opportunity is supplied by the decay of
democracy, by its clear inability to maintain "order" by the old
means, and by the equally clear danger which threatens the
working masses. Anyone who does not take advantage of this
situation, who calls on the "state, " i.e., the class enemy, to "act,"
in effect sells the proletariat's hide to the Bonapartist reaction.
Therefore, we must vote against all measures that strengthen
the capitalist-Bonapartist state, even those measures which may
for the moment cause temporary unpleasantness for the fascists.
Naturally, the Social Democrats and the Stalinists will say that
we are defending the fascists against Father Colijn, who, after

all, is better than the evil Mussert.291 We can say with assurance
that we are more farsighted than the others and that future
developments will completely confirm our perceptions and our
demands.
We can, however, formulate certain amendments which, when
they are rejected, will make it clear to every worker that what is
at stake is not the fascists' rear ends but the proletariat's hide.
For example: (1) Workers ' pickets are not to be affected by this
law under any circumstances, even when they are o bliged to take
action against strikebreakers, fascists, and other lumpen ele
ments; (2) the trade unions and the political organizations of the
working class reserve the right to construct and arm their self
defense organizations in the face of the fascist danger. The state
is committed to aid these organizations with weapons, ammuni
tion, and financial support on demand.
In parliament, these motions sound rather strange and Messrs.
Statesmen (and the Stalinist posturers) will regard them as
"shocking. " But the average worker, not only in the NAS, but in
the reformist trade unions as well, will find them quite
justified.292 Naturally, I offer these amendments only as an
example. One could, perhaps, find better, more exact formula
tions . Will Messrs. Social Democrats and Stalinists deny their
support or even vote against them? Even if they vote for them,
the motions will fail nevertheless, and then it will be absolutely
clear why we vote against the government motion as a whole
and we must do this without any second thoughts whatsoever for
the reasons given above (even if the Colijn parliamentarianism
rules these amendments out of order on the grounds that they
apply only to propaganda technique and not to the essence of the
matter).
We have to take strong measures against the abstract
"antifascist" mode of thinking that finds entry even into our own
ranks at times. "Antifascism" is nothing, an empty concept used
to cover up Stalinist skulduggery. In the name of "antifascism"
they instituted class collaboration with the Radicals. Many of our
comrades wanted to give the "People's Front," i.e., class
collaboration, positive support in the same way that we are ready
to support the united front, i.e., the separation of the proletariat
from the other classes. Starting from the thoroughly false slogan
"People's Front to power," in the name of "antifascism" they go
still further and declare that they are inclined to support
Bonapartism-for voting for Colijn's "antifascist" bill would
mean nothing less than direct support for Bonapartism.
STALIN'S REVOLUTIONARY
PRISONERS293
January 1 5, 1936
The letters and documents recently published by Comrades

Tarov and Ciliga have served to greatly stimulate interest in the
repressions of the Soviet bureaucracy against the revolutionary
fighters. Eighteen years after the October Revolution, at a time
when, in accordance with the official doctrine, socialism has
conquered "finally and irrevocably" in the USSR, revolutionists
who are unwaveringly devoted to the cause of communism but
who do not recognize the dogma of the infallibility of the Stalinist
clique are clapped into j ail for years; incarcerated in concentra
tion camps ; compelled to do forced labor; subjected, if they
attempt to resist, to physical torture; shot in the event of re al or
fictitious attempts to escape; or deliberately driven to suicide.
When hundreds of prisoners, in protest against the intolerable
harassment, resort to the terrible means of a hunger strike, they
are subjected to forced feeding, only in order to be placed later
under even worse conditions. When individual revolutionists,
finding no other means of protest, cut their veins, the GPU
agents, i.e., the agents of Stalin, "save" the suicides only in order
then to demonstrate with redoubled bestiality that there is no real
s alvation for them.
Into this horrible picture, Comrade Ciliga's account introduces
an element that is especially tragic. He was one of the former
leaders of the Yugoslav section of the Comintern. Under any
other conditions the differences of opinion between the leaders of
this party would h ave been settled by means of discussion, by a
convention, and, in extreme cases, by a split. But not in the
Comintern. That section of the national Central Committee
which at any given moment executes the instructions of the
Moscow clique, transmits a request to the latter to rid it of the
opposition. Stalin orders the Oppositionists to Moscow, where,
after a brief attempt to "convince" them, they are placed under
245
arrest, clapped into solitary confinement, and subjected to other

forms of physical extirpation. Among the hundreds who were
killed as b eing "implicated" in the Kirov case-i.e., in most
instances being in no way involved in this case-a number of
Bulgarian and other foreign Oppositionists were shot. The right
of asylum for revolutionary refugees is thus conditioned upon
their binding themselves to renounce all right to think indepen
dently. A call to Moscow "for a conference" implies time and
again a treacherous trap . If the "criminal" is beyond grasp, then
his wife, daughter, or son are seized. In these cases, the agents of
Stalin utilize methods worthy of the best qualified American
gangsters.
The so-called Communist parties not only cover up these
unprecedented villainies of Messrs. M arshals and Super
Marshals against the revolutionists-villainies in which the
leaders of the various sections of the Comintern take direct part
but the press of the Comintern seeks on top of this to turn the
edge of the accusation against the victims themselves. Involved
here, you see, are not mere Oppositionists, n ot Bolsheviks who
rebel agains t Stalin's arbitrariness or the patriotic degeneration
of the Comintern. No; involved, if you please, are "terrorists,"
conspirators against the s acred person of the Leader or one of his
marshals, and finally, agents of foreign espionage, the hirelings
of Hitler or the Mikado. Zinoviev and Kamenev have been caught
red-handed in a horrible crime: they criticized (within four walls!)
the adventuristic tempo s of collectivization that led to the
senseless destruction of millions of people. A genuinely proletar
ian court, investigating the case, would h ave indubitably clapped
in j ail the adventurists-collectivizers. But the court of Stalin and
Yagoda sentenced Zinoviev and Kamenev to ten years imprison
ment on the charge of-a terrorist act in which they were not and
could not in any way be implicated!
Not more than two years ago the Social Democratic, labor and
trade union press eagerly seized upon revelations not only of the
actual but also of the fictitious crimes of the Soviet bureaucracy,
in order thus to compromise the October Revolution as a whole.
At the present moment a complete about-face has occurred along
this line, in E urope at any rate. The policy of the social-patriotic
"united front" has become transformed into a conspiracy of
mutual concealment. Even in those countries where no united
front exists because of the insignificance of the Communist
parties, the reformist organizations prefer not to quarrel with the
Kremlin upper crust who, today, after they had inscribed upon
Stalin 's Revolutionary Prisoners 247
their banner the defense of the League of Nations and of the

democratic fatherland, are immeasurably closer to them than the
revolutionary internationalists who are being persecuted. The
"defense of the USSR" serves of course as a pious justification for
passing in silence over the crimes of the Stalinist bureaucracy.
In this connection, we ought to mention also a special category
of the professional "friends" of the Kremlin: intellectuals in
search pf a gilt-edged ideal, writers who have taken stock of the
superiorities of the State Publishing House, lawyers who are
hungry for publicity, and, finally, ordinary amateurs who are
attracted by free trips and anniversary banquets. These people,
parasites in most cases, then eagerly broadcast throughout both
hemispheres the inventions and insinuations that the agents of
the GPU buzz into the ears of their "friends" during heroic
suppers given in honor of the October Revolution. Suffice it to
refer only to the unworthy role assumed by so outstanding a
writer as Romain Rolland!
The fraternization between the heads of the degenerated
Comintern and the heads of the Second International evokes,
however, a salutary reaction as well. An ever greater number of
advanced workers are beginning to open their eyes. Such
"socialist morals" as constant crawling on the belly before the
"leaders, " Byzantine flattery, the creation of castes of "red"
colonels, generals, and marshals, the reactionary cult of the
petty-bourgeois family, down to the resurrection of the Christmas
tree-all these compel thinking workers in all countries to
surmise to what profound extent the ruling stratum of the Soviet
Union has managed to degenerate. On this soil of awakened
critical consciousness are falling today the accounts of the
bestialities perpetrated by the bureaucracy upon those revolution
ists who are a threat to its sacred privileges, and who stubbornly
refuse to accept the gospel of Dimitrov, Litvinov, and the League
of Nations.
The number of such "criminals" is constantly increasing. In
the course of the latest purge of the ruling party of the USSR (the
latter part of 1 935) there were expelled, insofar as one can gather
from the official data from ten to twenty thousand "Trotskyists"
alone. All the expelled in this category are, as a general rule,
immediately arrested and subj ected to conditions that used to
prevail in the czarist hard-labor camps. These facts must be made
known to the working class of the entire world!
To be sure, even at present there are still to be found in the
West not a few activists in the workers' movement who sincerely
ask themselves the following question: But will not exposures of

this sort bring harm to the Soviet Union? Is there not the danger
that together with the bathwater the baby , too, may be thrown
out of the tub? These fears, however, have no basis in reality.
Can the exposures of the Stalinist bestialities perpetrated upon
revolutionists damage the Soviet Union in the eyes of the
bourgeois world? Just the contrary is the case, for the entire
bourgeoisie, including the White Guard emigres, sees the best
pledge of the "normalization" of the Soviet regime in Stalin's
offensive of extermination against the Bolshevik-Leninists and
other revolutionists . The serious and responsible capitalist press
of the entire world is unanimous in applauding the struggle
against the "Trotskyists ." Small wonder! For Litvinov, side by
side with the representatives of world reaction, sits in the Geneva
Commission for the struggle against " terrorism."294 Involved
here, of course, is not the question of the struggle against
governmental terror against revolutionary workers, but the
question of the struggle against individual avengers, aiming at
crowned and uncrowned tyrants . Marxists, as is well known,
have irreconcilably rejected and continue to reject the method of
individual terror. But this has never prevented us from always
siding with William Tell and not with the Austrian despot
Gessler. Soviet diplomacy, on the other hand, is now discussing
j ointly with the Gesslers how best to exterminate the Tells. By his
participation in the international stalking of terrorists , Stalin
supplements in the best m anner possible his own terroristic
stalking of the Bolsheviks. It is self-evident that in the eyes of the
League of N ations, in the eyes of the American government, even
in the eyes of Hitler, our exposures will only strengthen Stalin's
already quite extensive credit.
As regards the reformist labor bureaucracy in bourgeois
countries , there is no reason to have any fears either. The
reformist bureaucrats are quite well informed about the facts of
the Stalinist repressions, but during the last two years they h ave
deliberately and maliciously passed over them in silence. In the
eyes of Leon Blum, Otto B auer, Sir Walter Citrine, Vandervelde,
and Company, our exposures will not, in any case, lower their
esteem for the Soviet bureaucracy; involved here is a friendship
that is calculated, and this friendship is directed first of all
against the left, the revolutionary wing.
There still remain the masses of workers. In their maj ority, the
workers are sincerely and honestly devoted to the Soviet Union,
although they do not always know how to express this devotion
Stalin 's Revolutionary Prisoners 249
in action . The masses find it all the more difficult to find a correct
road on this question because bureaucratic apparatuses are
raised over them, duping them incessantly and skillfully. Thus ,
the matter is reduced to the following simple question : Are we for
our p art duty-bound to tell them the truth? For a Marxist, to pose
this question is to answer it. The revolution has no need of blind
friends, or allies whose eyes are bandaged.
The workers are not children. They are capable of appraising at
one and the same time b oth the colos s al conquests of the O ctober
Revolution and the onerous historical heritage that has coagulat
ed on its body in the shape of a frightful bureaucratic ulcer. A
revolutionist who is afraid to tell the masses what he knows
himself is absolutely worthless! We leave double bookkeeping to
the patriotic parliamentarians, parlor idealists, and priests. Will
the " Friends of the Soviet Union" and other philistines perhaps
say that we are motivated by "factional" and even "personal"
malice? Of course they'll say it. But we have not yet become
accustomed-thank goodness-to look upon philistines and their
public opinion otherwise than with contempt. By embellishing
the present it is impossible to prepare the future. Loyalty to the
October Revolution demands mercilessly exposing, and, if need
be, cauterizing its sore s . Lies serve as the instrument of the
possessing classes. Today, lies have become the instrument of the
Soviet bureaucracy as well. The oppressed need the truth. The
workers must know the whole truth about the Soviet Union, so
that impending events do not catch them off guard.
Through the medium of all honest publications , it is necessary
to broadcast as far and wide as possible the news of the vile
repressions to which irreproachable proletarian revolutionists are
subj ected in the Soviet Union. Our chief and immediate task
therefore is : to alleviate the fate of tens of thousands of the
victims of bureaucratic vindictiveness. It is necessary to come to
their assistance by all the possible means that flow from the
situation and from our burning desire to save the heroic fighters.
Fulfilling this task, we will thereby assist the toilers of the Soviet
Union and of the entire world to take a new step forward on their
road to emancipation.
Q UESTIONS OF A BRITISH GROUp29 5
January 1 5 , 1936
Dear Comrade:
I would be very glad of course to establish personal connection
with your group. In order to be able to render our contact fruitful
and efficient, it is necessary for me to have more detailed
information about your group. Therefore I take advantage of your
offer to send me information, etc., to ask some questions. It
stands to reason that you will answer me in a very cautious
manner in order to avoid any harm to your activity. Henceforth
you might sign your letters with "Edgar," for instance. Regard
ing myself, I shall use all your information with the utmost
prudence.
1. Does the group succeed in maintaining inner discipline?
2. Has it some influence upon other sections and affiliated
organizations such as, for example, the trade unions, the co-ops,
etc.?
3. Has the group new members? What is the number of the
members of the whole group?
4. Has the group lost some members as the result of opportu
nist adaptation to the [Labour] Party apparatus?
5. Do you receive regularly the New Militant and New
International? How many copies?
6 . Have you some p ersonal contact with the Bolshevik-Leninist
faction within the ILP? Do you get Controversy of the ILP and
the bulletins of the Bolshevik-Leninist faction?
7. What is your opinion about the work of the Bolshevik
Leninists in the ILP and about the results they obtained? Do you
believe that there are larger possibilities within the Labour
Party? Or more concretely: Do you believe it more favorable for
them to leave the ILP in order to enter the Labour Party?
8. Will you publish the printed paper inside or outside the
Labour Party? Certainly not as a faction paper? Perhaps in the
name of a local group of the official party?
250
Questions of a British Group 251
9. What is the standpoint of your group as regards the Open

Letter of the Fourth International?
L. T. to De.
The answers to my ques tions need not be "official"; that means
that not the whole group must examine and approve them. I shall
regard the correspondence as private correspondence. Maybe two
or three different comrades might give me their opinion about m y
questions with the purpose o f procuring a complete, i.e., many
sided view of the situation. I should be pleased, of course, to get
all kinds of information, documents, etc. , about your activity.
Fraternally yours,
L. Trotsky
The tenth question: Have you contact and influence within the
youth movement?
P.S.-C an we write in German or French? It would be far easier

for us. You can continue in English, of course.
FOR ENTRY IN THE U.S.29 6
Letter to Cannon and Shachtman

January 24, 1936
Dear Comrades :
Today I decided to cable you as follows: "Personally in favor of
entry. Leo." P reviously, I too dealt with this question not as a
principled one. When two say the same thing, it is, nevertheless,
not the same. When a tested and stable organization enters a
centrist party, it may be a correct or an incorrect tactical step, i. e.,
it can bring great gains or it can bring none. (The latter is, in any
case, under the p resent circumstances, unlikely.) But it is not a
capitulation. The split in the Socialist Party is of the greatest
importance as an objective symptom for the tendencies of its
development. I am also in agreement with you that one should
not give the centrist leadership any time to allow for the
poss ibility of consolidation; this m eans : act quickly.
Naturally, certain European groups will seek to interpret the
eventual entry as a d eparture from the Fourth International. But
to these we should not attach the least importance. The problem
is not to appear a little stronger, but to become much stronger.
I hope you will do everything possible to complete this step in
common with the Muste-Weber group. Then your activities within
the Socialist Party will be of greater significance for the
successful outcome of the contemplated step.
I want to emphasize that my cable as well as this letter
represents my personal opinion. You are now discussing the
question. Time p resses. With the cable and with this letter I wish
to take part in this discussion before the IS is in a position to
formulate its collective opinion.
With friendly greetings,
Yours ,
L.T.
252
For Entry in the U.S. 253
Letter to A.J. Muste

January 24, 1936
Dear Comrade Muste:

Enclosed is a copy of my letter to Cannon and Shachtman. As
you know from my earlier s tatements, I have been very prudent
in asses s ing this question. The split in the Socialist Party
convinces me that no more time must be lost.
The psychological obs tacles connected w ith giving up organiza
tional independence must b e courageously overcome. The step
must be taken in a united and decisive fashion. It will have
positive results . How long it will take and how broad it will be
that is difficult to predict, especially from here. In any case, the
Workers Party will become incomparably more mature politically
by this experience. This important step is dictated by the entire
situation, and in a few months it will seem perfectly natural.
L.T.
Letter to Jack Weber

January 24, 1936
Dear Comrade Weber:

Enclosed are copies of my letters to C annon and Shachtman
and to Muste. I have nothing to add to what is said in those
letters.
I can only advise you and your close friends to put aside all
personal considerations and think of the entry as a necessary,
though h ardly "agreeable," s tep.
L.T.
STALIN FRAME-UP MILL AT WORK29 7
January 30, 1936
The local Stalinist paper Arbeideren, central organ of the

Stalinist CP, has just published a dispatch that Trotsky is
waging a war against the Soviet Union in an alliance w ith
Hearst, the American newspaper magnate, a world-famous thug,
and an ally of Hitler.298 According to this dispatch, I published a
series of articles in the Hearst press under my own name. One
day before Arbeideren publis hed this sensation , I received a cable
from New York, from my friends there, dealing with the fraud
perpetrated by Hearst. I sent immediately the following cable to
Cannon in New York:
"Publication of Tarov article by Hearst common press gang
sterism. But impudence of Hearst no excuse for crimes of Stalin
clique. Gave statement to Associated Press. Trotsky"
At the same time I gave a statement to the AP.
It is most highly interesting that the small Arbeideren was
immediately apprised by cable from New York about my alleged
articles, i.e . , the fraud perpe trated by Hearst. I t is self-evident
that the other papers of the Comintem were even more amply
instructed on this matter, so that they could do their best or
worst. This shows that involved here is not only Hearst's press
trust, but another and much more important " trust. "
To make my thought clear to you, I will cite another instance:
On June 20, 1931 , a Polish newspaper Kuryer Codzienny gave a
prominent display to a leading article allegedly signed by me.
This article was a forgery concocted from a few small quotations
from an article of mine combined with several of the crudest
inventions and supplements by the forger.
Moscow Pravda immediately published an enormous facsimile
reproduction of this article under the heading "A New Assis tant
of Pilsudski. " At the same time this article was printed
somewhere in New York City by an archreactionary newspaper.
Thereupon I sent a brief note to Pravda demanding that it retract
its own report in order not to dupe the Rus s ian workers and
254
Stalin Frame-Up Mill at Work 255
peasants [see "A Letter to Pravda," in Writings 30-31]. In any

case, in Biulleten Oppozitsii, of which I am the editor, and in
many other papers, I not only disproved this matter but also
proved that Kuryer Codzienny obtained the forgery through an
agent of the GP U upon orders from Moscow, in order thus to
obtain s ensational material for a slander campaign [see "Scoun
drels and Their Assistants" in Writings 30-31].
Matters are not much different today. The revelations of Tarov
and Ciliga are highly embarrassing to the Stalinists, for they
involve not theoretical or political discussions but hard and
irrefutable facts. These facts come all the less propitiously to the
Stalinists because in the course of recent m onths, according to
the data in the Moscow press, not less than 10,000 (in reality
many mo re) Bolshevik-Leninists have been expelled from the
party-i.e., naturally, placed under arrest and sent to concentra
tion camps, exile, etc.
Are we p erhaps dealing here with enemies of the Soviet Union?
You may rest assured that in the hour of greatest danger, when
99 percent of the so-called "Friends of the Soviet Union" and
perhaps a goodly half of the Soviet bureaucracy will betray the
October Revolution, these men who were arrested will be its truest
defenders . Their "crime" lay precisely in their desire to save the
October Revolution from infamy and degeneration; namely, they
were a gainst the social inequality that is growing sky high,
against the intolerable p ressure on the workers , against the
introduction of ranks into the Red Army , headed by marshals,
etc.
To parry these unpleasant revelations Moscow must find some
means of diversion, for they are not in a position to operate with
facts and political arguments. They tried to implicate me in the
Kirov affair. They failed because the terrorist acts of Niko laev
directed by the GPU took a very serious turn . The bullet was fired
before Yagoda and Medved could place under arrest the
organization they thems elves controlled [see several articles on
the Kirov assassination in Writings 34-35]. Then they tried the
matter of the Zeller postcard. Again, without much success. From
now on they intend to let it be known: whoever speaks about the
abominable crimes of the Moscow bureaucracy is a brother-in
arms of Hitler. It is understood that world reaction will try to put
to use every revelation. Even when the mild Maxton casts a
sharp word against the Labour Party in Parliament, the
Diehards [Tories] applaud ironically. Are these grounds for
Maxton to keep quiet?
In order for reaction to be unable to make use of the crimes of

the Stalin clique, the crimes must cease and not the revelations.
I do not know whether Hearst lifted certain of my articles
directly from the Russian Biulleten or whether his "assistant"
(who may well be an "assistant" of the GPU at the same time)
has concocted some sort of a series of articles for him. The gist of
the matter is hardly altered thereby. I will try to prosecute Hearst
for fraud or literary theft. But this will not alter matters. Hearst's
rascality is not a mitigating circumstance for the crimes of the
Moscow Bonapartists.
Since Arbeideren also makes mention of you personally in its
newest exposure, I am supplying you with this information,
which is completely at your disposal. You can make any use of it
you may deem necessary.
At the same time I am sending a copy of this note with the
same aim to the foreign editor of Arbeiderbladet.
A CRISIS IN THE WORK E RS PA RTY299
February 6, 1936
1 . The main argument of Comrade X: A crisis in the Workers

Party would be very harmful for us. It should therefore be averted
at all costs, etc.
The crisis, however, is already here and not since yesterday. It
was a lingering crisis which has now once m ore passed over into
a highly acute state. It is therefore necessary to combat not the
abstraction of the crisis, which could only lead to a sterile
conciliationism without any practical result, but rather to find
the correct political way out and then to help the party, with all
forces, to adopt this way out as unitedly as possible.
2. The nub of the crisis consists of the attitude toward the
Socialist Party. This question determined all the old and new
groupings after the unification conference of the party. There was
no lack at all of well-meant compromise resolutions. But they
didn't help matters much. The question remained open and along
with it also the crisis. The expulsion of the Oehlerites signified
that the question of entry was considered a purely tactical and
not a principled question, that is, that one's hands are kept free
for the future.
The charges against Cannon-Shachtman, that they concealed
their "malignant" plans, that they denied their intentions of
entering into the Socialist Party, etc., I cannot take seriously even
for a single minute. Cannon-Shachtman had doubts on this
question, as did many of us with regard to France, then Belgium,
and finally Poland. These doubts are quite natural, for it is not a
question of abstract principle but of the correct evaluation of the
concrete circumstances. But since the other groups-at first the
Oehlerites, then also the Muste-Weber group-put up a stiff
resistance against the possibility of entry-even if from different
motivations-and demanded a commitment from Cannon
Shachtman against entry, the latter attempted, on the one hand,
not to commit themselves in advance, but on the other hand, not
257
to exacerbate relations unnecessarily inside their own party. That

explains their evasive and waiting attitude. E very politician can
recall similar situations out of his past. To see a crime in that is
incorrect.
3. The split inside the SP seemed to Cannon-Shachtman to b e
key to the decision. I t is necessary t o strike while the iron is hot.
Now, when everything has reached a state of flux and the
Stalinists are working at high p ressure, it is after all a bit b el ated
to propose an inside fraction. In the course of the last year the
present defenders of fraction-formation made it impossible to
form the fraction in practice. That's also how it was in France.
Naville and Lhuiller worked with all their might against the
formation of a fraction inside the SFIO. But when entry was
proposed, they promptly came forward in favor of creating a
"broad" fraction.
It can be s aid: What do w e care about the development in the
SP? We go our own way. But this is precisely the way of the
Oehlerites, which leads from nothin g to nothin g. But if we are of
the opinion that the situation in the SP offers significant
possibilities, we should promptly make a courageous turn,
without losing time, enter the party, constitute ourselves as a
faction, prevent the destructive work of the Stalinists, and thus
take an impo rtant step forward.
4. To point to this-namely, that the Workers Party is already
an independent party and thus a pillar of the Fourth
International-belongs, in my mind, not to Marxian but to purely
decorative p olitics. The Muste group called itself a party even
before the fusion, but it wasn't one. The WPUS is not yet a party.
Its policy must flow from its ess ence and not its name. It must
undertake not those steps which justify its name juridically, but
those which can make it a real party.
Also, from the standpoint of the Fourth International there is
no other consideration. We do not carry on prestige politics. All
that benefits our sections will also benefit the Fourth Internation
al. We must have patience, and always project further the goal of
our actions.
In any cas e, after the French and in part also after the Belgian
experience, nobody will be able to conceive of the entry as a
capitulation, and if a SAPist makes wisecracks about it we will
not begrudge him this pleasure.
5. "The Socialist Party of America is small, has a bad social
composition, etc . . .. " Nor do I have the slightest illusions on
that score. For that matter, we won over not tens of thousands,
A Crisis in the Workers Party 259
not even thousands, but only hundreds in France, in a large

Socialist Party. How we will make out in Belgium, in that
powerful POB, nobody seems to know at the moment. But
everything must be evaluated relatively. Had our French section
not entered at the right time, it would have degenerated
completely by now. That the step was correct is demonstrated by
the fact that we won back the split-off group of Naville. Nor is the
splitting-off of Molinier a counterproof: in the course of a couple
of weeks, La Commune, under our political pressure, had to make
a complete about-face (despite the organizational mistake
committed). 3 0o It seems to have renounced its philistine platitudes
("parity of formations" and "three points" instead of a program),
and to want to return once more to the Fourth International. If
we act intelligently, we will win back the healthy core of this
group with its new supporters.
6. The Socialist Party of the United States is not accidentally
weak. The political gathering together of the proletarian
vanguard proceeds at a frightfully slow pace in America. Engels
had to fight with everybody in his time over this question. It
should not be forgotten, however, that those fundamental causes
which make difficult the crystallization of a socialist-to say
nothing of a revolutionary-vanguard in America, operate not
only against the SP but also against us; and that in spite of the
altered economic conditions the great psychological inertia,
which has been developed into a tradition by the trade unions,
cannot be overcome in a trice. Everything is relative. In the
American milieu, the unhampered rapprochement of the Socialist
and Communist parties would signify the greatest impediment to
us for a whole period. To refuse to see this would really be
blindness.
7. In large parties, the force of cohesion is much stronger than
in small ones; one does not break so lightly with a mass party.
That explains in part why, in France, we retained relatively so
few new elements in the expulsions. Just because the American
SP is not a real mass party our influence may prove to be much
more decisive. One can estimate the practical possibilities as
modestly as one wishes, but nobody will contest that the Workers
Party together with the Spartacus Youth League can-let us
say-double their numbers. Even only a 50 percent gain would
not be without significance in this situation. In any case, this
must be considered assured in advance. At all events, after the
French and Belgian experiences, nobody will now dare to contend
that our organization will be absorbed by the centrist milieu. In
America, because of the relationship of forces, this is rather even

much less possible than in the European countries named. We are
thus not courting any political danger in this step. A gain,
hovvever, is certain.
8. The greatest gain, hovvever, vvould consist in this, that this
step vvould finally be exhausted. That it cannot be exhausted by
discussions and mile-long resolutions has been demonstrated
adequately in the last year. I proceed naturally from this-and
nobody vvill dare to doubt it-that none of the factions intends to
betray the principles of Marxism. The centrist milieu vvill bring
them closer together, as vvas the case in France. Together, they
vvill have to fight out an important, direct, and sharp battle. The
results vvill come. Even if they don't vvin over a single person (an
entirely fantastic hypothesis) the Workers Party vvill be more
mature and more cohesive. Mter a long-lasting crisis an end vvill
finally be reached.
9. Let us assume that the Muste-Weber group gains the upper
hand in this question and the Cannon-Shachtman group submits;
that vvould only mean the continuation of the present situation in
the Workers Party. Cannon-Shachtman vvould assert that vve are
not moving ahead because vve didn't join the SP. Muste-Weber
vvould reply that vve are not moving ahead because the vvorkers
knovv that Cannon-Shachtman may lead us into the SP. This
situation vvould lead almost inevitably to the further envenoming
of internal relationships and to a split.
10. It may be said that I am painting the future too black. I
don't believe it; I only see it realistically. The high winds are now
blowing against us. The danger of fascism and vvar, the
bureaucratically exploited economic successes of the Soviet
Union, the opportunistic turn of the Comintern, the grovvth of the
centrist-pacifist unity pressure-all that is vvorking temporarily
against us.
A political radicalization in America vvill, in the next months
and perhaps also in the next fevv years, benefit primarily the
Communists and the Socialists, especially if they form a firmly
cohesive united front. The Workers Party in such a case vvould
remain on the side, almost entirely as a purely propagandistic
organization, vvith all the consequences of the internal quarrel
over missed opportunities. A speedy entry vvould prevent the
demoralization of the Socialist left vving by the Stalinists, expose
the incorrigible centrist leaders, promote clarification in the
vvorkers' vanguard, and precisely thereby strengthen our posi
tions for the future.
A Crisis in the Workers Party 261
1 1. "But can we really enter the SP?" "Can we really do

something there?" Here we must leave the responsibility to
Cannon-Shachtman. They reply in the affirmative to both
questions, which are not easy to judge from afar. On the other
hand, not even Muste and Weber deny the possibility of entry and
influence. Only the other road seems to them to be more
advantageous. The other road, however, is tested and has proved
to be a permanent crisis. On this point what is necessary has
already been said above. By the experiment of entry-I do not
fear to use the term "experiment"-we will hardly lose a single
member; whether or not we win something more or less, the
future will show.
LETTER TO A.J. MUSTE3 01
February 8, 1936
Dear Comrade:
I shall try to explain briefly my use of the cable and my point of
view regarding the visit of Comrades Spector and White.302
First, I have received letters and documents in the past from
both sides, not only for my personal information but also with the
purpose of giving me the opportunity to express my opinion. I
used the cable because of the desirability of speed. I emphasized
that I was giving expression to my personal opinion [see "For
Entry in the U.S."].
2. I considered the previous controversial letter of Cannon and
Shachtman as one of the inevitable measures in an acute
factional struggle [see "A Brief Remark"]. I considered the
publication of the letter as a regrettable mistake. I have received
analogous letters from comrades adhering to the other factions.
3. I consider the visit of Comrades Spector and White also as
one of the inevitable means in an acute factional struggle. I
assert that their expositions were absolutely loyal and that they
did not in any way presume to represent the party. They
discussed with me fraternally only in the name of their caucus.
4. As a result of the discussions, we each stand by our own
positions. I should, however, be glad if our conversations could
contribute to the elimination of the worst practical consequences
of the present acute discussion.
Fraternally,
L. Trotsky
262
STATEM ENT TO ASSOCIATED PRESS 303
February 8, 1936
During recent months and weeks I have received extremely

important news, from authentic sources, relative to the terrible
regime against political prisoners, whose fidelity toward the
Soviet Union is beyond doubt and whose only "crime" is that of
criticizing the ruling bureaucracy.
Friends have requested me by cable to let them know the truth
of this matter through the Associated Press.
A short time ago, for example, Doctor Anton Ciliga, former
leader of the Yugoslavian Communist Party, arrived from the
Soviet Union, where he spent more than five years in prison and
exile as punishment for his critical attitude toward the leadership
of the Comintern.
In order to force his expulsion from the country, Ciliga began a
hunger strike. He was then fed forcibly and prevented from
committing suicide. Thousands of expelled members of the ruling
party are in similar circumstances because they protested against
the conditions of growing inequality, introduction of army-officer
titles, dissipation, and autocracy.
Zinoviev and Kamenev, close collaborators of Lenin, are now
imprisoned for a terrorist crime with which they had nothing
whatsoever to do. Kamenev, the former chairman of the Political
Bureau, is kept in a cell together with twelve others. Last year an
additional five years were added to his original five years
imprisonment for his alleged participation in plotting a terrorist
assassination of Stalin.
Accurate and absolutely objective information by Ciliga, Tarov,
and others proves increasing antagonism between the bureau
cracy and the developing population. The bureaucracy is
compelled to have recourse to the sharpest repressions, in the
interests not of the Soviet state, but of its own self-preservation.
It is indisputable that enemies of the Soviet Union and of its
friendly relations with the United States make use of such
information for their own purposes. But the way to avoid such
misuse is not to conceal the facts of the bureaucratic crimes, but
to put an end to the crimes themselves.
263
S OM E ADVIC E
T O A BRITISH GRoupao4
March 7, 1936
Dear Comrades:
I have gratefully received all the letters and documents. Only
an illness has prevented me from answering them promptly. I
will now make up for my remissness.
You have called upon me to collaborate in the journal which
you are planning. Alas, I do not know on what programmatic
basis and under what political banner you contemplate publish
ing the journal. Moreover, your letters and documents allow me to
fear that the differences which led you to split from our
organization have not lessened since then but have increased. I
should be very glad if this impression of mine should prove
incorrect. I consider it as simply necessary to express my opinion
quite clearly to you.
1. You broke with us a couple of years ago because you
considered the trend towards the ILP as "opportunistic." Your
standpoint was for an independent organization. Since then,
however, you have joined the Labour Party, which has given rise
to a new split in your ranks.
The question whether one should enter the ILP or the Labour
Party was and remains for us not a question of principle, but a
question of practical opportunity. By your own conduct you have
shown the unsoundness of the basis which led you to split from
us. I do not see from your letters or your documents that you have
understood the big mistake you made in breaking with the only
international Marxist organization.
2. It is quite unclear what ideas and methods are advanced by
your activity inside the Labour Party. Our group in the ILP fights
quite openly for the ideas and methods of Bolshevism and the
Fourth International. I will not exaggerate their results or deny
that there have been certain tactical errors. But the Marxist
Group is the only group which openly defends the Fourth
264
Some Advice to a British Group 265
International in England.305 And for us the future of the world

proletariat is bound up with the Fourth International.
As against this, your group appears only as the left wing of the
Labour Party, i.e. , as a vague centrist trend. You have recruited
hardly any new elements. It would indeed be hard to do this
without a program, without a political banner. The fact that
many comrades from your group occupy positions in the Labour
Party or the trade unions is without revolutionary significance,
because these comrades represent no definite program, but have
been elected only on the basis of their individual activity. All
historical experience teaches that this is the shortest way to get
absorbed into the reformist bureaucracy.
3. To the question which I put, you have replied that you are
certainly in principle for the Fourth International but that you
consider it impossible to make propaganda for it inside the
Labour Party. This standpoint is hard to understand, let alone to
approve. The Labour Party and Trades Union Congress bureau
cracy is nothing else than the political police of capital within the
working class. When revolutionaries do only what the police let
them, then they are not revolutionaries.
Obviously, in carrying on the fight with the thoroughly
corrupted blackguards who lead the Labour Party, one must act
with prudence and foresight. That concerns only the technique of
revolutionary work, not its content. How one carries on propagan
da for the Fourth International inside the Labour Party is a
question for yourselves. If one renounces the carrying on of this
propaganda, then one surrenders directly to the Second Interna
tional.
4. To my question as to whether it had been shown by
experience to be more advantageous for the Bolshevik-Leninists
to work in the ILP or in the Labour Party, you have replied that,
in spite of your view on the possibilities in the ILP being
exhausted, a move by the Marxist Group toward the Labour
Party is not desirable-and why? Not perhaps because one
cannot work in the Labour Party but because the Marxist Group
is .. .too low (base, vile) for the Labour Party. There you go
rather too far. You think that the Labour Party, led by artful
careerists, traitors, and chauvinists, is too good for the Bolshevik
Leninists and that your group had, so to speak, the mission of
protecting the Labour Party from the intrusions of the Marxist
Group.
If the situation were like that, what would be the purpose of my
collaborating in your forthcoming journal?
5. As proof of the "vileness" of the Marxist Group you quote its

conduct in the election campaign. When Mr. Attlee, Clynes, and
Company say "We cannot receive these people for they have
boycotted us," I am not surprised.306 That you, however, should
place this purely tactical question above all other questions
reveals a state of mind that seems to me to be extremely
dangerous. The boycott slogan was a tactical mistake, which,
however, emerged from revolutionary premises; your exaggera
tion of this mistake is also a mistake, but it comes from
opportunist premises.
6. The adherents of the Fourth International belong-whether
formally or not-to an international organization whose
members are spread all over the world, who work closely together,
mutually criticizing and controlling each other. That gives them
certainty that when they make mistakes they are also able to
correct these mistakes. What guarantees, however, are possessed
by your group, which has no program, belongs to no internation
al organization, and has a policy consisting of adaptation to the
"left" wing of the bureaucracy?
Now to the key conclusions. My entire activity is bound up with
those organizations which take their stand on the basis of the
Open Letter for the Fourth International. I can therefore
collaborate in your paper-and will do this with pleasure-only if
it makes the Open Letter for the Fourth International its
program. This step must not, however, be of a platonic character,
but must have organizational consequences of a national or
international kind. That is to say, your group must again take up
the international connections which you broke off two years ago.
You must also enter into close connection with the Marxist Group
to carry on revolutionary work in the future in close understand
ing. I am sure that an understanding on a firm programmatic
basis can only produce the best results, and I am ready to work
with you for it with all my might.
HOW TO WORK IN THE SP 307
March 9, 1936
Dear Comrade Cannon:

I am not yet in possession of the decisions of the last
conference. I hope, however, that everything went off well. In any
case, I have received a telegram from Comrades Muste, Spector,
and Abern in which they announce their loyal support of the
decision adopted. 308
The most important thing now (should entry into the SP be
realized) is to carry out our work both solidly and effectively.
In America today you have no such burning questions as in
France. The exposure of the centrist leaders will be difficult, to a
certain degree, for what is involved is after all not the
employment of such arguments as are weighty only for our own
comrades but pass off without effect upon the Socialist rank and
file. Besides, in France, also, far too much energy was expended
upon the frequently purely phraseological "exposure" of the
leaders, and too little for a more deep-going work at the base,
especially among the youth. This error, in my opinion, you should
seek to a void in America.
An important component part of our work is to win the
younger, thoughtful elements-who are able to develop-for our
program, for our past, and thereby also for our future. This can
occur only by means of well-organized propaganda. Our com
rades can perhaps arrange a series of courses for the youth, but
also for the adults: on the October Revolution and the Soviet
Union, on the Chinese revolution, on the developments in
Germany and Austria, on the Spanish revolution, on the program
of the Comintern, and so on, and so forth. This "quiet" work
would immediately present before the best Socialist elements the
immense superiority of our cadres and thereby also make them
more attentive to and approachable by our open, current
criticism.
Naturally, I am not contrasting this propagandistic work, in
267
any case, to mass work. Quite the contrary. To draw the local
organizations of the SP into local struggles and to evoke the
necessary differentiation in their midst on the basis of these
struggles remains the foremost task of our faction. The more
deep-going propaganda must, however, create points of support
among amicably inclined elements in every Socialist organiza
tion and therewith first make possible their being drawn into
mass actions. Otherwise, in the event of a rupture with the
centrist apparatus, only those elements who have more or less
theoretically grasped the content of our struggle will be with us.
So far as the criticism of the centrist leadership is concerned, it
is very important to pay attention to this: that this criticism
should not lose itself in side issues which can only irritate the
Socialist following, but should be concentrated upon well chosen
and important questions. There is a certain danger that our
comrades will react in meetings with mockery and contempt to
the centrist superficialities and platitudes. From the very
beginning this may create an unfavorable atmosphere for us. For
the simple member who does not have the necessary political
training, it is difficult to raise himself to the level of our criticism,
and therefore irony (even the most deserved) can have a
disturbing, suspicion-arousing, and exasperating effect upon the
rank and file. This gives the centrist leaders the opportunity to
mobilize these sentiments against us. Therefore, the greatest
patience, a calm, friendly tone, are indispensable. Naturally, the
tone can and will change when you already have the necessary
points of support and when big political questions come up on the
agenda.
All this is of course not quite so easy, for the thing cannot be
played as if from a music score. But since we have good cadres
with serious experience, you can, I believe, suggest a definite
method of work to all our comrades.
All these considerations are of course much too abstract and
surely three-quarters superfluous, for, close at hand, you see the
things there much more concretely than we do here.* I only
wanted, in any event, to communicate to you these suggestions,
which come out of the French and partially also out of the
Belgian experiences.
*That is why I make these suggestions only in a private letter; they

seem to me to be entirely inadequate for a letter to the leadership. Besides,
I spoke briefly on this score with Comrades Spector and Paine.
How to Work in the SP 269
Information about what happens in America will be very

important for our International. It would naturally be highly
imprudent to send off official reports, etc. But a young comrade,
let us say Comrade Roberts, could send the necessary communi
cations (impressions, plans, etc.) in the form of private letters,
without thereby formally committing the leadership of our
faction.3og But it is very important that we here be kept steadily
informed about your new experiences.
With heartiest greetings,
Yours fraternally,
L. Trotsky
THE STALIN-HOWARD INTERVIEW310
March 18, 1936
What Does the Experience with Mongolia Teach?
In Stalin's interview with Roy Howard, the most important

thing from a practical standpoint is the warning that the military
intervention of the USSR is inevitable in the event of an attack
by Japan on the Mongolian People's Republic. Is this warning
correct in the main? In our opinion, yes. It is correct not only
because in question here is the defense of a weak state against a
predatory imperialist beast-for if this alone were the guiding
consideration, the USSR would be constantly at war with all the
imperialist countries of the world. The Soviet Union is too weak
for such a task, and in this weakness, we might immediately add,
lies the only justification for the "pacifism" of its government.
But the question of Mongolia is a question of the most
immediate strategical position of Japan in the war against the
USSR. In this domain the limits of retreat must be resolutely
fixed.
A few years ago the Soviet Union surrendered to Japan the
Chinese Eastern Railroad, a position also of extreme strategic
importance.311 At the time this action was acclaimed by the
Communist International as a voluntary expression of pacifism.
As a matter of fact, it was an act of compulsion due to weakness.
The Comintern had ruined the Chinese revolution of 1 925-27 by
its policy of the "National Front. " This untied the hands of the
imperialists. By surrendering an extremely important strategical
line, the Soviet government thereby facilitated Japan's seizures
in Northern China and present assaults against Mongolia. It
should now be clear even to the blind that abstract pacifism was
not involved in the surrender of the railroad (if that were really
the case, it would have been merely an act of stupidity and
betrayal), but rather an unfavorable relationship of forces: the
Chinese revolution had been annihilated, while the Red Army
and the Red Navy were not ready for the struggle.
270
The Stalin-Howard Interview 271
Now the situation has so obviously improved, in a military

sense, that the Soviet government considers it possible to resort
to a categorical veto on the question of Mongolia. We can only
welcome the strengthening of the position of the USSR in the Far
East, as well as the more critical attitude on the part of the Soviet
government toward the ability of Japan, torn by contradictions,
to wage a major, protracted war. It should be pointed out that the
Soviet bureaucracy, while it is very bold toward its own toilers,
easily falls into a panic when faced with imperialist opponents:
the petty bourgeois is unceremonious when dealing with the
proletarian, but stands ever in awe of the big bourgeois.
The official formula of the foreign policy of the USSR, widely
advertised by the Comintern, reads as follows: "We do not seek
an inch of foreign soil; neither will we surrender an inch of our
own. " Yet, in the question of Mongolia, the defense of "our own
soil" is not involved at all: Mongolia is an independent state. The
defense of the revolution, as this small example shows, is not
reducible to the defense of the frontiers. The true method of
defense consists in weakening the positions of imperialism and in
strengthening the positions of the proletariat and of the colonial
peoples in the entire world. An unfavorable relationship of forces
may compel, in the interests of saving the main base of the
revolution, the surrender of many "inches" of soil to the enemy,
as was the case in the epoch of Brest-Litovsk, and partly also in
the case of the Chinese Eastern Railroad. And, on the other hand,
a more favorable relationship of forces places on the workers'
state the duty to come to the assistance of the revolutionary
movement in other countries, not only morally but also, if need
be, with the assistance of armed force: wars of emancipation are
an integral part of revolutions of emancipation.
Thus, the experience with Mongolia shatters to pieces the
ideology of conservative pacifism, which bases itself upon
historical frontiers as though they were the Ten Commandments.
The frontiers of the USSR are only the temporary front-line
trenches of the class struggle. They lack even a national
justification. The Ukrainian people-to take only one of many
examples-is cut in two by the state boundary. Should favorable
conditions arrive, the Red Army would be duty-bound to come to
the aid of the Western Ukraine, which is under the heel of the
Polish executioners. It is not difficult to imagine the gigantic
impulse that would be given to the revolutionary movement in
Poland and in the whole of Europe by the unification of a
workers' and peasants' Ukraine. All state frontiers are only
fetters upon the productive forces_ The task of the proletariat is

not to preserve the status quo, Le_, to perpetuate the frontiers, but
on the contrary to work for their revolutionary elimination with
the aim of creating the Socialist United States of Europe and of
the entire world. But to make such an international policy
possible, if not at present then in the future, it is imperative for
the Soviet Union to free itself from the rule of the conservative
bureaucracy, with its religion of "socialism in one country." 3 1 2
Wherein Lies the Cause of War?
In reply to Howard's question as to what causes underlie the

threat of war, Stalin said, in accordance with tradition:
"Capitalism." As proof he cited the last war, which "arose from
the desire to divide the world." But remarkably enough, no sooner
does Stalin pass from the past to the present, from dim
theoretical recollections to real politics, than capitalism imme
diately disappears, and in its place are to be found individual
evil-minded cliques that are incapable of grasping the benefits of
peace. To the question of whether war is inevitable, Stalin replies:
"In my opinion the positions of the friends of peace are being
strengthened. The friends of peace can work openly (!), they base
themselves upon the force of public opinion, and they have at
their disposal such instruments as, for example (!!!), the League of
Nations. This is an asset for the friends of peace . . . . As for the
enemies of peace, they are compelled to work secretly. This is a
liability for the enemies of peace. Incidentally, it is not excluded
that precisely because of this (?) they may decide upon a military
adventure as an act of despair."
Thus, we find that humanity is divided not into classes, nor
into imperialist states warring with each other, but into "friends"
and "enemies" of peace, Le., into saints and sinners. The cause
for war (at any rate, for future if not past wars) is not capitalism,
which breeds irreconcilable contradictions, but the ill will of the
"enemies of peace," who "work secretly," while the French,
British, Belgian, and other slave owners do their work in broad
daylight. But precisely because the enemies of peace, like all evil
spirits, work secretly, they may, in a fit of despair, plunge into an
adventure. Who needs this philosophic mush? At best it can be of
service only to some old ladies' pacifist society.
As we have had the occasion to state before, the agreement
between the Soviets and France gives infinitely more guarantees
to France than to the Soviets. In the negotiations with Paris,
Moscow evinced a lack of firmness, or, to put it more bluntly,

Laval fooled Stalin. The events in connection with the Rhine
land313 are an indisputable confirmation that with a more
realistic appraisal of the situation, Moscow could have wrung
from France much more serious guarantees, insofar as pacts in
general can be considered "guarantees" in the present epoch of
sharp turns in the situation, continuous crises, break-ups, and
regroupments. But as we have already said, the Soviet bureaucra
cy shows much greater firmness in the struggle against the
advanced workers than in negotiations with bourgeois diplomats.
But no matter how he might evaluate the Franco-Soviet pact,
not a single serious-minded proletarian revolutionist ever denied
or denies the right of the Soviet state to seek an auxiliary support
for its inviolability through a temporary agreement with French
or some other imperialism. For this purpose, however, there is not
the slightest need to call black white and to rebaptize bloody
brigands as "friends of peace." As an example to be emulated,
one might take, let us say, the new ally, the French bourgeoisie:
in concluding the agreement with the Soviets the French
bourgeoisie presents this action very soberly without becoming
lyrical, without lavishing any compliments, and even maintain
ing a constant undertone of warning against the Soviet
government. However bitter it may be, it is necessary to speak the
truth. Laval, Sarraut,314 and their associates have shown a great
deal more firmness and dignity in defending the interests of the
bourgeois state than did Stalin and Litvinov in the service of the
workers' state.
Surely, it is difficult to conceive a more vicious stupidity than
that which divides the world brigands into friends and enemies of
peace! One could still speak, in a certain sense, about the friends
and enemies of the status quo: but these are two entirely different
things. The status quo is not the organization of "peace," but the
organization of the infamous oppression exercised by a minority
over the overwhelming majority of mankind. The status quo is
being maintained by means of constant warfare within the
sacred boundaries and beyond their precincts (England-in India
and Egypt; France-in Syria; de la Rocque-in France). The
difference between the two camps, which are, besides, very
unstable, consists in the fact that some of the brigands think it
more advisable even today to maintain the existing boundaries of
oppression and enslavement with arms in hand, whereas others
would prefer to blow up these boundaries sooner. This correlation
of appetites and plans is itself continually changing. Italy favors
a status quo in Europe but not in Africa; yet every assault upon
the boundaries in Africa is immediately reflected in Europe.

Hitler decided to send troops into the Rhineland only because
Mussolini had succeeded in slaughtering several thousand
Ethiopians. Where should we enroll Italy: among the friends or
the enemies of peace? And yet, France cherishes friendship with
Italy infinitely more than friendship with the Soviet Union.
Meanwhile, England is courting the friendship of Germany.
The "friends of peace" work in the open (who would have
thought it!) and have at their disposal "such instruments as, for
example, the League of Nations." What other "instruments" have
the friends of peace, outside the League of Nations? Obviously,
they have the Comintern and the Amsterdam-Pleyel Committee.
Stalin failed to mention these auxiliary "instruments" partly
because he himself does not attach any great importance to them,
and partly because he did not want to frighten his interlocutor
unnecessarily. But Stalin does completely transform the League
of Nations, which has been fully discredited in the eyes of all
mankind, into a bulwark of peace, the prop and hope of nations.
In order to utilize the imperialist antagonisms between France
and Germany there was not and is not the slightest need for
idealizing the bourgeois ally or the particular combination of
imperialists that temporarily screens itself behind the League of
Nations. The crime does not lie in this or another practical deal
concluded with imperialists but in the fact that both the Soviet
government and the Comintern are dishonestly embellishing
their episodic allies and the League; are duping the workers with
slogans of disarmament and "collective security"; and thereby
are actively transformed into the political agency of imperialis m
in relation to the working mass es.
The program of the Bolshevik Party drafted by Lenin in 1919
replied to all these questions with remarkable clarity and
simplicity. But who thinks about this document in the Kremlin?
Today, Stalin and Company find embarrassing even the eclectic
program of the Comintern compiled by Bukharin in 1928. For this
reason we think it useful to quote from the program of the
Bolshevik Party on the question of the League of Nations and the
friends of peace. Here is what it states:
"The growing pressure on the part of the proletariat and
especially the victories gained by the latter in various countries
tend to increase the resistance of the exploiters and engender on
their part the creation of new forms of the international
unification of the capitalists (League of Nations, etc.), which,
while organizing on a world scale the systematic exploitation of
all the peoples on earth, aim their immediate efforts toward the
direct suppression of the revolutionary movements of the
proletariat in all countries.
"All this inevitably leads to the correlation of civil war within
the individual states with the revolutionary wars both of the
proletarian countries defending themselves as well as of the
oppressed peoples struggling against the yoke of the imperialist
powers.
"Under these conditions the slogans of pacifism, of internation
al disarmament under capitalism, of arbitration courts, and so
on, are not only a reactionary utopia but also a downright
swindle of the toilers aimed to disarm the proletariat and to
distract the workers away from the task of disarming the
exploiters."
It is precisely this criminal work that both Stalin and the
Comintern are fulfilling: they are sowing reactionary utopias,
swindling the toilers, disarming the proletariat.
The " Comic Misunderstanding"

about the World Revolution
Nobody compelled Stalin to satisfy Howard's thirst for

knowledge on the question of the world revolution. If Stalin gave
the interview as the unofficial head of the government (and this
is indicated by his statement with regard to Mongolia), then he
could have simply referred his interlocutor to Dimitrov on
questions about the world revolution. But no, Stalin went into
explanations. At first sight it appears entirely incomprehensible
why he should have thereby compromised himself so cruelly by
his cynical and, sad to say, not at all clever disquisitions about
the world revolution. But he is driven onto this slippery road by
an insurmountable need: he must break with the past.
What about the plans and intentions relating to the revolution?
asks the visitor.
"We never (!) had such plans and intentions."
But, what about . . .
"This is all the result of a misunderstanding."
Howard: "A tragic misunderstanding?"
Stalin: "No, a comic, or, perhaps, a tragicomic one."
It is embarrassing even to read and transcribe these lines, they
are so inappropriate and indecent. For whom is this . . . wisdom
intended? Even the pacifist ladies will reject it.
Asks Stalin: "What danger can the neighboring states see in
the ideas of the Soviet people, if these states are really firmly
placed in the saddle?" Very well, permit us to ask, what about
those who are not placed firmly in the saddle? Yet that is how
matters stand in reality. Precisely because its position is
precarious, the bourgeoisie fears Soviet ideas, not Stalin's ideas
but those ideas that led to the creation of the Soviet state. To
soothe the bourgeoisie, Stalin adduces a supplementary argu
ment: "The export of revolution is nonsense. Every country,
should it so desire, will itself achieve its own revolution, and if it
does not desire it, there will be no revolution. Now, for example,
our country desired to make a revolution and made it. . . . " And
more of the same, in the same smug, pedantic tone. From the
theory of socialism in one country Stalin has completely and
decisively passed over to the theory of revolution in one country.
If a "country" so desires, it will make it; should it not desire it-it
won't make it. Now, "we," for example, desired it. . . . But before
desiring it, "we" imported the ideas of Marxism from other
countries and made use of foreign revolutionary experience. In
the course of decades, "we" had our emigre organization in other
countries which directed the revolutionary struggle in Russia. In
order to give a methodical and active character to the exchange
of experience between countries and their mutual revolutionary
support, "we" organized the Communist International in the year
1919. "We" more than once proclaimed as the duty of the
proletariat of a victorious country to come to the assistance of the
rising peoples-with advice, material means, and, if possible,
with armed force. All these ideas (incidentally, they bear the
names of Marx, Engels, Lenin, Luxemburg, Liebknecht) are
written down in the most important programmatic documents of
the Bolshevik Party and of the Comintern. Stalin has proclaimed
that all this is a misunderstanding! A tragic one ? No, a comic
one. Not for nothing has Stalin recently announced that it has
become "merry" to live in the Soviet Union: now even the
Communist International has become transformed from a serious
entity into a comedian. And how could it be otherwise, if the
international character of the revolution is mere and sheer
"nonsense"?
Stalin would have made a much more convincing impression
upon his interlocutor, if instead of impotently slandering the past
("we never had such plans and intentions"), he had on the
contrary openly counterposed his own policy to the antiquated
"plans and intentions" which have been relegated to the
museum. Stalin might have read Howard the very same
quotation from the program which we gave above, and then made
approximately the following brief speech: "In the eyes of Lenin
the League of Nations was an organization for the bloody
suppression of the toilers. But we see in it-an instrument of
peace. Lenin spoke of the inevitability of revolutionary wars. But
we consider the export of revolution-nonsense. Lenin branded
the alliance between the proletariat and the national bourgeoisie
as a betrayal. But we are doing all in our power to drive the
French proletariat onto this road. Lenin lashed the slogan of
disarmament under capitalism as an infamous swindle of the
toilers. But we build our entire policy upon this slogan. Your
comical misunderstanding"-that is how Stalin could have
concluded-"consists in the fact that you take us for the
continuators of Bolshevism, whereas we are its gravediggers."
Such an explanation would have dispelled the last shreds of
suspicion of the world bourgeoisie and would have definitely
established Stalin's reputation as a statesman. Unfortunately, he
does not dare as yet to resort to such frank language. The past
binds him, the traditions hamper him, the phantom of the
Opposition frightens him. We come to the assistance of Stalin. In
accordance with our rule, in the present case, too, we openly say
what is.
'THE POINT OF N O RETURN' 3 1 5
Stalin's Order t o Demyan Bedny
Published April 1936
The reactionary litterateur Aldanov, 3 l6 who writes historical

novels which treat the emancipatory movement of mankind from
the standpoint of an alarmed philistine, has occupied himself of
late with writing historical notations to the October Revolution.
In one of his feuilletons, basing himself on a ludicrous analysis of
the budget of Pravda for the year 1 9 1 7, he attempts to prove that
the Bolsheviks did "just the same" receive German money. To be
sure, in the process, the multi-million subsidy is reduced to a very
modest sum; but, in return, the moral and mental equipment of
the historian himself rises to its heights.
In a subsequent feuilleton Aldanov recounts how Trotsky, in
June 1918, informed the German diplomat Count Mirbach, that
we Bolsheviks "are already dead, but there is as yet nobody
around able to bury US. " 3 l 7 Mirbach himself, as is well known,
was killed shortly after June by the left SRs. This story, retailing
the words of one Botmer, who in turn quotes the dead diplomat, is
so absurd in itself that it is hardly worthy of notice. In June
1918-and, therefore, just in the period between the time the
rapacious BrestLitovsk peace was signed and the day he left for
the front in Kazan-Trotsky gave secret information-and to
whom? to a diplomat of Hohenzollernl-to the effect that
Bolshevism was "already dead." This is a case of slander passing
into raving.
But there is always a consumer for anything vile. And one was
found in this case also. The January 30 issue of Pravda carries
several yards of Demyan Bedny's jingles in which the account of
Botmer-Aldanov is taken to be an incontrovertible truth, and as
the final proof of Trotsky's "permanent treachery. " Today,
Pravda is the personal organ of Stalin. Demyan Bedny fulfills a
personal order. Today, Pravda does not venture as yet to carry
278
"The Point of No Return" 279
verses relating how Lenin and Trotsky received money from the
German general staff, but the moral evolution of the Bonapartist
bureaucracy is nevertheless proceeding in this direction . To
Aldanov, at any rate, the receipt of the Hohenzollern subsidy by
the Bolsheviks and Trotsky's conversation with a Hohenzollern
diplomat constitute an entity. In Pravda, together with its "poet,"
the single whole does not emerge as yet. But, never mind! The
order was fulfilled. The meaning of the order is expressed in the
following quatrain:
Too bad, indeed, that in Berlin

They, before us, this news did learn!
The route, for such leaders, is a march
To hell, from where there's no return.
This "poetical" conclusion is of course based not upon a

fictitious conversation years ago but upon the actual events in
our own time. The Fourth International is a dire threat to these
gentlemen. The growth of the Leninist ("Trotskyist") Opposition
in the USSR frightens the usurpers. That is why they find it
necessary to seek inspiration from Aldanov-Botmer.
Yet, once upon a time, this same Bedny also wrote about
Trotsky in a somewhat different tone, and, moreover, in the very
heat of the civil war, at a time when men and ideas found
themselves subjected to a serious test. Apropos of a rumor
alleging that General Denikin, the chief of the White Army, 3 1 8
was making preparations to have himself crowned, Demyan
Bedny published in Izvestia, some sixteen months after the
alleged declarations of Trotsky to Mirbach, the following verses:
Strike no hero's poses, king!

Our deuce will do the covering.
Our aim is sure, we are no chumps,
For ours is the deuce of trumps.
Lenin-Trotsky, there's our deuce,
Try to match it, if you choose!
Why, Denikin, the sudden blues?
There is no covering our deuce.
Aldanov, incidentally, also quotes this ditty; but in contrast to

the conversation with Mirbach, it does not happen to be an
invention but an absolutely genuine product of Demyan's
creative efforts. It was printed in Izvestia, October 19, 1919.
Repulsive as it is to probe into this mess, we hope that the

reader will bear with us: a few rhymed lines can convey much
better the atmosphere of 1 9 1 9 and the then prevailing mood in
the party than all the latest luxuriant growths of falsifications
and calumny. "Lenin-Trotsky, there's our deuce." How is that?
How could a man who gave out treacherous statements to the
august ambassador of the kaiser turn up on the same "deuce"
with Lenin? And where is Stalin? Is it possible that Demyan
Bedny, who lived in the Kremlin, who met all the top leaders in
the party, who, it is even told, used to sup in the dining room of
the Council of People's Commissars-is it possible that Demyan
Bedny remained unaware of the fact that the "deuce" was
Lenin-Stalin? Or it may be that Demyan Bedny was unacquaint
ed with Stalin? No. Bedny worked with Stalin in the legal
Bolshevik publications back in 1 9 1 1 , and perhaps even earlier. He
was well acquainted with Stalin, with Stalin's past, his specific
weight, his intellectual resources. Demyan knew very well what
he was writing. And if he did not know, how did Izvestia, the
official government organ, happen to print verses in which
Trotsky's name creeps in by mistake instead of Stalin's? Or, was
it merely done, perhaps, for the sake of a rhyme? And, finally,
why and how did the party keep quiet about these sacrilegious
verses? We ought to add that in those days no one ordered
laudatory verses from Demyan Bedny-we had occasion for
different things at that time, and besides, the people were
different-the verses simply expressed what was in the air.
History is not a heap of old rags that can be placed into a
machine and converted into clean paper. A Russian proverb says:
"What is written down with a pen cannot be hacked away with
an axe." The history of those years was written not merely with a
pen-at any rate, not only with the pen of Demyan Bedny. If in
1919 Bedny, picked up by the great wave, on his own initiative
executed the literary order of the masses, then in 1936 he fulfills
only the order of Stalin. This customer pursues aims which are
not at all literary but purely practical. Demyan Bedny, as we
already know, was ordered to provide the formula for the
necessity of sending Trotsky to a place "from where there's no
return."
Stalin is obviously making preparations to entrust the
fulfillment of this task to the "poets" from the school of Yagoda,
the general commissar.
And that is how we record it!
ONCE A GAIN
ON THE S OVIET S ECTION 3 1 9
Published April 1936
In a public report on December 30, 1935, Khrushchev, the leader

of the Moscow organization, 320 the most important and the
largest in the party, boasted that the checkup of party documents
had resulted in success. The enemies of the party were exposed:
"Trotskyists, Zinovievists, spies, kulaks, White Guard officers."
The order in which the categories of the expelled are listed is very
remarkable, indeed! In Moscow, the kulaks and White Guard
officers occupy the last place: they were taken care of long ago by
the previous purges in the capital. There is no need to dwell upon
"spies" as a special category. Thus, the chief targets of the purge
in Moscow were the Trotskyists and the Zinovievists. But, no
more and no less than 9,975 members of the party alone were
expelled in the city alone, apart from the district itself !
In Leningrad, 7,274 people were expelled. Zhdanov, the
Leningrad leader of the party,321 announced that "the counter
revolutionary Zinovievists occupy a notable place (1) among the
expelled." In Leningrad, as is well known, the Left Opposition
has traditionally assumed a Zinovievist coloration, which must
have become accentuated after Zinoviev was clapped in jail. If
among a number of more than 7,000 the Zinovievists occupy a
"notable place," then it is quite clear that we are not dealing with
a few scores or hundreds. Precisely for this reason the reporter
was careful to evade mentioning the figure.
In addition to the "Trotskyists" and "Zinovievists," Zhdanov
made an obscure reference to "opportunists of all sorts." In all
probability this label covers those party members who have
shown resistance to the bureaucratic excesses of the Stakhanov
movement. There need be no doubts that the opposition
groupings in the working class have been revived precisely by the
new pressure upon the workers, accompanied with new and
monstrous privileges for the bureaucracy and the "best people." It
281
is noteworthy, in any case, that neither Khrushchev nor Zhdanov

had a single word to say in reference to either the Mensheviks or
the Social Revolutionaries.
We wrote, on a previous occasion, that during the last months
of 1935 not less than 10,000 and most probably close to 20,000
Bolshevik-Leninists were expelled from the party (exclusive of
party candidates and Young Communists). On the basis of the
reports of Khrushchev and Zhdanov that have been published
since then, we conclude that not less than 1 0,000 "Trotskyists"
and "Zinovievists" were expelled in the two capital cities alone.
We failed to run across a single reference to the "Democratic

Centralist Group" or to the "Workers' Opposition, " either in the
general listing of the categories of the expelled, or among the
individual reports, articles, and notes. It is quite probable, of
course, that isolated expulsions of the representatives of these
groupings took place, but they were so few numerically that they
were included among the general category of "others." This fact
is of major political importance. With the preservation of the
socialized means of production and with the collectivization of
the overwhelming majority of the peasantry, the economic and
cultural successes of the Soviet Union prove all too clearly that
the social foundations established by the October Revolution
have not been destroyed, despite the threatening bourgeois
degeneration of the ruling stratum, and that these foundations
can create the necessary preconditions for a future socialist
society.
To place the USSR on the same plane with capitalist states is
to throw out the baby with the bathwater. The advanced workers
want to throw out the bathwater of the bureaucracy but at the
same time they wish to safeguard and bring up the baby. That is
why, even years ago, when times were much more difficult, the
oppositionist movement in the working class refused to follow the
Mensheviks. That is why today it has obviously turned its back
upon the Workers' Opposition, the Democratic Centralists and all
others who approach the old Menshevik positions from the "left. "
I n this fact w e have an incontrovertible verification o f our
program, for it has been subjected to testing not only in theory
but also in practice. The struggle against the bureaucratic caste
and the regime of privileges, the struggle for the socialist future
of the country, the struggle for the world revolution, takes place
in the USSR under the banner of the Bolshevik-Leninists, and
only under their banner.
AN HONEST BOO K 3 22
March 21, 1936
Le Mouvement o uvrier pendant la guerre: De l'Union sacree a

Zimmerwald [The Labor Movement During the War: From the
Sacred Union to Zimmerwald]. By Alfred Rosmer. Paris. Librairie
du Travail.
Here is a book that comes just at the right time! What an
invaluable source of historical information and revolutionary
education! In truth our old friend Rosmer could not have found
better use for his capacities and his knowledge, and the Librairie
du Travail could not have published a book more urgently
required at the present time.
The first thing that ought to be said is that it is an honest book.
The Communist International is flooding the literary market
with productions in which ignorance mingles with dishonesty.
The productions of the school of Leon Blum and his consorts are
more "subtly," more "decently" false in appearance, but none the
less so for that. These people have something to hide. They justify
their past deceptions or prepare new ones for the future. With
Rosmer there are no secret thoughts or hidden designs: he
expounds that which was. Between his ideas and the facts there
is no contradiction and he is naturally interested in expressing
the whole truth. An extraordinarily scrupulous personal
conscience-which is not, alas, a quality frequently found among
writers-causes him to verify the facts, the dates, the quotations
at first hand. Feuilletonist improvisation is foreign to him. He
penetrates into his material like an explorer.
But that is precisely why his book has a gripping interest. The
historical sketch of the French labor movement after the
Commune; the preparation of the imperialist war; the conduct of
the various proletarian organizations before the war and at the
moment it broke out; the epidemic treason of the trade union and
parliamentary bureaucracies; the first voices of protest and the
first acts of struggle; the attempts at international regrouping
283
284 Writings of Leon Trots ky (1935-36)
and the Zimmerwald Conference-these are the contents of a

volume of almost six hundred pages.
This historical work seems at the same time to be a devastating
political pamphlet: in the pages of Rosmer's book the social
patriots, of the Second International as well as of the Third, can
find ready-made almost all the falsifications that they are now
putting in circulation to dupe the workers. Leon Blum, Marcel
Cachin, and their similars are now reliving a "second youth,"
more shameful and more cynical than the first. That is precisely
why every serious proletarian revolutionist ought to read-more
exactly, to study-Rosmer's book. To be sure, the book, due to its
size, is expensive; but this obstacle should be overcome by
gathering together in groups to buy a copy jointly. Every
revolutionary organization ought to provide its propagandists
with this book in order to arm them with facts and invaluable
arguments. The rule should be established: nobody in our ranks
who has not studied Rosmer's work ought to be allowed to speak
publicly on the question of war.
These lines are not a critical evaluation of the book; or else we
would have pointed out also some points on which we are not in
agreement or in full agreement with the author. At present we
want only to draw the attention of all internationalists to this
work about which the press of the two patriotic Internationals is
maintaining silence, just as it preserves an ignominious silence
about every serious and honest production of revolutionary
thought. With all the greater vigor and friendliness should the
press of the Fourth International acclaim this work.
Let us add in conclusion that the book is written in excellent
language-calm, clear, and precise-and is very well presented.
THE PLAN TO EXTERMINATE
THE BOLSHEVIK-LENINISTS 3 2 3
March 25, 1936
The March 15 issue of Pravda carries a semiofficial order that

emanates from a high source, obviously from Stalin, and deals
with the treatment to be accorded the expelled party members.
The question is not a simple one because, as we have only to
recall, from the second half of last year to the present day more
than 300,000 have been expelled-perhaps even half a million.
The smallest percentage of the party members expelled is 7
percent, but in several instances over one-third have been
expelled. At the present time the purge is continuing under the
guise of "exchanging party cards," or, as Stalin's order states, the
party continues to rid itself of "Trotskyists, Zinovievists, White
Guards, and other filth." This list, and the order of naming the
categories of the expelled, have become very firmly established,
and, moreover, in all the lists, both local and general, the
"Trotskyists" invariably occupy the first place. This means that
the heaviest blows are directed against them.
Stalin's order leaves no room for doubt on this score. On the
surface the order seems to be intended as a check upon the
excessive zeal of local organizations, who are depriving all the
expelled of work. With unexampled bureaucratic jesuitism, Stalin
intervenes in behalf of certain categories of the expelled. Thus,
the order remarks that certain Communists have been expelled as
passive elements, for breaches of discipline or of party ethics.
Harshness toward them is unwarranted. If they are too
compromised for their old work, they must be given new work.
One should not needlessly breed enemies. "Unfortunately, this
simple truth is not understood everywhere." A man who has
committed "some sort of a grave breach of party ethics" may
nevertheless remain a "useful individual for our socialist
country"-under one condition: that he is not an "enemy," i.e.,
the enemy of the bureaucracy. If a man has embezzled, given or
285
taken bribes, beat up an underling, or raped a girl-in short,

committed a "grave breach of party ethics" -but has in the
meantime remained loyal to the powers that be, then this "useful
individual" must be given other work.
The chief quality that the order demands from the party leaders
is: "the ability to distinguish between the enemy and the
nonenemy." Ruthlessness is recommended only with regard to
the political opponent. A docile grafter is not an enemy. The
mortal enemy is the honest Oppositionist, who must be deprived
of work of every kind.
The only employer in the USSR is the bureaucracy. Stalin's
order implies in practice the doom of tens of thousands of
Oppositionists to the tortures of unemployment and homeless
ness, even when they are exiled. To be sure, this used to be done
before too, but not in every case. Today, this has been erected into
a system.
This order of Stalin, which bears the caption "On Bolshevik
Vigilance," must be brought to the attention of the workers the
world over. Not a single appropriate occasion should be missed to
raise this question at workers' meetings. Wherever possible, it is
necessary to penetrate into the trade union press. Everything
must be done to prevent Stalin from physically exterminating
tens of thousands of irreproachable young fighters.
S UGGESTIONS FOR
THE BELGIAN SECTION324
March 2 7, 1936
Dear Comrade Dauge:

1 . On expulsion from the party: In such a complicated and
delicate situation, the only correct course is not to be concerned
with riddles-What will the bureaucracy do? When and how will
they expel us?-but to develop ever wider, ever deeper, ever more
unrelenting revolutionary activity. With respect to the [POB]
statutes, of course, we must remain on the defensive right up to
the moment of expulsion; but politically we develop a tireless
offensive. Moreover, questions of statutory defense should occupy
only one percent of your energies. Ninety-nine percent must be
devoted to the offensive against the reformists, the centrists, and
the pacifists.
We must reply to each threat of expulsion not by excuses, not
by adapting to the apparatus, but by redoubling the vigor of our
revolutionary offensive: we must declare openly that in their
preparation for a new slaughter the reformist traitors want to rid
themselves of embarrassing witnesses.
It is completely wrong to believe that in the present struggle the
workers will be influenced exclusively or even mostly by legalistic
considerations-who initiated the split, etc. This element natural
ly plays some role, but what is decisive in this extremely critical
situation is the political content, the merit of your accusations
and denunciations, and finally the tone of complete confidence in
your position that must pervade your newspaper and all of your
activity.
This does not mean that I am suggesting extravagances,
exaggerations of language, or tactical blunders. But it is the
strategic line that is decisive. Our language must be aimed not at
the ears of Vandervelde, or even Godefroid or Libaers, 325 but at
the ears of the workers who are the most conscious, the most
courageous, and the most dissatisfied: it is these elements, in the
final analysis, who will play the decisive role.
287
You are numerically weak, but your revolutionary position

makes you very strong. The coming epoch will open unprecedent
ed possibilities before you-on just one condition: that you not
weaken your own chances by seeking the line of least resistance
with the reformists, centrists, and pacifists.
2. The considerations expressed in the first paragraph apply
totally to electoral politics: not to take the initiative in the split
but not to yield an inch in the realm of slogans and criticism.
3. The split is predetermined by the inexorable logic of the
whole situation. It is necessary to prepare for it in advance:
(a) We must work out the action program of the new party by
immediately opening the discussion on two documents: (1) the
Open Letter for the Fourth International; (2) the draft program of
the ASR, reworked according to experience or to criticism already
made. The discussion of the program will be an excellent
education for the cadres of the new party.
(b) We must take systematic organizational measures with
respect to the plans of the political party (POB), the unions, and
the youth.
4. The split will not be carried out in a single blow. After the
expulsion of the leading nucleus, the struggle will continue in the
local organizations. Everything will depend at this critical time
on the tone of the ASR: it will have to inspire confidence in its
supporters and sympathizers. The whole of revolutionary
experience shows that in such situations the rank-and-file
elements often prove more decisive than the leadership, who,
frightened by the prospect of isolation, begin to weaken, disorient
even their best supporters, and end up . . . being isolated. The
most recent experience took place in France, where the leaders of
the Bolshevik-Leninists under the goading of Molinier were
aiming, at the crucial moment, above all not to break with
Marceau Pivert (the French equivalent of Godefroid and Libaers);
they toned down their slogans, gave way, and disoriented their
own ranks, with the result that they strengthened Lagorgette32 6
and Marceau Pivert, and weakened their own position.
5. Even after total separation, the new party must keep a
clandestine fraction in the POB. There is no reason to believe
that your expulsion will be the last. With the help of events, there
will again be internal struggles, defections, expulsions, and
splits. The new party must have loyal and discreet supporters in
the POB.
6 . It would be an irreparable error to withdraw your members
from the economic organizations, the unions, etc.-by no means!
To create small, parallel unions would mean to take upon oneself
Suggestions for the Belgian Section 289
a crushing responsibility without any possibility of fulfilling

their respective tasks in the foreseeable future. Even if you had
already been an independent organization for a long time you
would have to send your members into the unions, mutual
societies, etc . . . . You need the independent party not to compete
in a small way with the mass organization, but to win them from
inside. That is the only way. The party is the instrument of our
work; it must be well forged, well tempered, and well honed. But
with this instrument we must work where the masses really are.
Then we have to pay dues to a treacherous bureaucracy? Yes,
indeed; we have to pay to get in if we want to have an
opportunity to undermine the bureaucracy.
The whole inconsistency of the Comintern is revealed by this
dual fact: while they stayed in the mass organizations, the
Stalinists made shameful deals with the reformists; when they
broke from the reformists, they created parallel trade unions
which were nothing more than a replica of the party. The
Bolshevik policy is altogether different: an independent party for
systematic, patient, tireless work inside the mass reformist
organizations, in permanent struggle against the reformist
leaders. This work must be partly open, partly clandestine,
according to the circumstances and the opportunities.
The time is coming when the revolutionary elements will 'be
compelled to work under conditions of illegality. For a revolution
ary party an illegal existence in certain periods is, so to speak,
normal. The party is a selection of the vanguard elements, that is,
the most conscious and the most courageous ones.
The trade union as a mass organization cannot exist illegally.
If you create small revolutionary unions, they would immediately
be hit by government repression and almost inevitably wiped out.
However, if your members remain in the reformist unions, they
will have not only a necessary social milieu around them, but
also legal cover against repression.
The reformist leaders, of course, will harass them and even
hand them over to the police. But that means only that we must
learn to work in secret from the reformist leaders, who themselves
are nothing other than the unofficial capitalist police within the
working class itself. Preparation for revolutionary illegality
begins above all in the reformist unions. We must have comrades
in them who work openly, leaving themselves open, in the final
analysis, to expulsion. We must have others there who are not
orators, but who are capable, by systematic work, of gathering
around them revolutionary nuclei in the unions.
Even during 1917, when we had already become a powerful
party with a decisive hold on the soviets, most of the unions still
remained under the leadership of the Mensheviks. Did we split
from the unions? Not at all! We stayed in them to the end, that is,
up until we captured the union leadership. Our situation then was
more favorable than yours in other ways. The great lesson of
Bolshevism is the intransigence of the party toward reformism
and centrism and the greatest flexibility towards the mass
organizations. Without the first quality the party inevitably
becomes the instrument of capital; without the second, the party
remains a sterile sect forever. It is the synthesis of iron hardness
and extreme flexibility that assures success.
8. The break with the party imposed by the bureaucracy in no
way means the voluntary desertion of the youth organization.
Quite the contrary. It is precisely at the moment of expulsion that
it is necessary to launch an unrelenting campaign among the
youth against the reformist traitors, splitters, and expellers, for
unity on a revolutionary basis. By this campaign, we must take
care of the Godefroids. By this policy-if the split proves equally
inevitable among the youth-we will take with us at least a solid
part of the organization. And even in the event of such a split, it
will be necessary to keep a clandestine fraction among the youth.
9. This policy requires a correct attitude-i.e., not the least
compromise towards Godefroid and Libaers. It is on this point
that the greatest weakness of the ASR appears. The greatest
danger for a revolutionary is to have illusions not only about
one's enemies, but also about one's allies. I do not deny the
possibility and the necessity of some alliance or other with the
centrist Godefroid or the pacifist Libaers. But the Marxist rule
concerning alliances says: view today's ally as tomorrow's
potential enemy, and openly denounce every mistake on his part,
in order to prepare the workers for a possible, and even probable,
betrayal. To say openly what is is a useful rule.
No illusions about Godefroid. Even the French Radical
bourgeois, to defend themselves against the fascists, try to use
the Socialists and Stalinists. If Godefroid really wanted to defend
himself against the reformists, he would also have to try to use
the "Trotskyists." But he is using every means to try to eliminate
and expel them. It is an unmistakable symptom: Godefroid is
consciously preparing a betrayal.
You mention Godefroid's attack against the chauvinist Hubin.
But what of it? If Godefroid ends his polemic even against those
of Hubin's ilk, his respect among the youth is destroyed. In order
to prepare his reconciliation with the bureaucracy he must keep
Suggestions for the Belgian Section 291
up appearances. Ris attack on the "Trotskyists" is a political act;

his polemic against Rubin is nothing more than rhetoric.*
You may say that I am "exaggerating."** Fair enough. I will
accept for the moment the hypothesis that Godefroid has not yet
made the definitive choice, that he is maneuvering, waiting for
favorable opportunities on the right or the left. But even in this
case the only correct tactic is to denounce Godefroid, openly to
unmask his contradictions, to criticize his newspaper in an
amicable but uncompromising manner, etc. . . . By putting him
in a crossfire you will force his hand; you will oblige him to make
a choice. If you say, "In the event of his betrayal, I would not
hesitate to attack him," etc. . . . you deceive yourself and you
sow illusions. "Betrayal" is not always like a gunshot; more often
it is a backsliding. And Godefroid has been sliding for a long
time. To wait for his definitive betrayal means only to neglect the
revolutionary education of the youth and to pave the way for the
success of Godefroid.
10. Absolutely the same applies to Libaers.
1 1 . Someone will say: "But won't our criticism of the centrists
and pacifists prevent us from making an alliance with them
against the bureaucracy?" Not if they really do want to strug
gle against the bureaucracy. They know that they can always
count on your support, and they will not hesitate to expel or
dismiss revolutionaries. So should you renounce the right to
criticize them? That would be a very advantageous capitulation
for them, and a criminal one for the revolutionary wing.
*Besides, by attacking Rubin and keeping quiet about Vandervelde,

Godefroid doubly misleads his readers: Re is making a distinction in
principle between Rubin and Vandervelde, and covering the latter by his
decorative attacks against the former. In this way, he supports social
patriotism while pretending to combat it.
**Besides, there is exaggeration and there is exaggeration. By this I
mean that one can exaggerate in the right direction and in the wrong
direction. Take for example Lenin's book Against the Stream. In his
polemic against me he used some obvious exaggerations, which were
refuted by subsequent events. But these exaggerations were dictated to
Lenin by his overriding concern to give the greatest precision to his
thoughts. Everyone (myself included) could learn from these exaggera
tions and can still do so today, whereas an "exaggerated" confidence in
the centrists and the p acifists educates nobody; in fact, it is very
demoralizing, and it covers up the centrists' slide toward complete
betrayal.
12. The creation of a new party is a long and difficult task.

Expulsion from the POB would be only the beginning. Even if in
the beginning you are but a handful, a few hundred, you will be
able to do remarkable work, on the condition-I will not tire of
repeating it-that you combine programmatic firmness and
intransigence toward the reformists and centrists with the
greatest flexibility and patience toward the mass organizations.
OPEN LETTER
TO A BRITISH COMRADE327
April 3, 1936
Dear C omrade:
The article written against me in the New Leader of March 20
of this year is sharp but incorrect. The sharpness is good. One
must always welcome it when a revolutionary defends h is ideas
with sharpness and precision. Unfortunately, in spite of all the
sharpness I fail to notice the necessary precision.
The polemical article sets itself the task of defending the
"International Bureau of Revolutionary Socialist Parties"
against my attacks. My criticism of the parties affiliated to the
bureau is said to be totally wrong. These parties are s aid to be by
no means disintegrating, but on the contrary to be showing
themselves more and more unified in the international struggle.
Let us try to verify these assertions . As far as I am concerned, I
know of only one single common international action of the
London Bureau. That is the creation of the "World Committee for
Peace. " I carefully criticized at the time the program of this
committee, proposed by the SAP on the basis of their document,
and branded it, with perfect jus tification, I think, as an
express ion of the shallo west petty-bourgeois pacifism. No one, not
even the leaders of the SAP, has ever given a material and
pertinent answer to this criticism. My point of view, consequent
ly, remains valid. Parties which adopt a pacifist attitude on the
question of war canno t be regarded by a Marxist as revolutionary
proletarian parties. Maxton, for instance, is a pacifist and not a
Marxis t. His policy on war can perhaps contribute much to the
saving of his soul, but scarcely to the liberation of the working
clas s .
The above-mentioned committee w a s formed of three people:
the German, Schwab, the Frenchman, Doriot (!), and the
Spaniard, Gorkin. S ince then Doriot, the host of the last
conference of the so-called revolutionary socialist parties, has
gone o ver with his clique to the reaction. Gorkin campaigned for
election in Spain with a miserable democratic pacifist People's
Front program. And the third member, Schwab, has up to now
293
not yet explained that the Committee for Peace was an

antirevolutionary undertaking and that the program laid down
by him, Schwab, for the "fight for peace" mocks the whole
teaching of Marx and Lenin in every word_ (Incidentally there are
still a few lamb-like people who think that they can still convince
the minority of the SAP by endless, totally abstract discussion.
We certainly believe that Schwab and some other leaders with
their reactionary ideas are in the minority. But that this minority
is to be won by good words-no, we are really not so naive as to
believe that.)
This, then, is at present the growing capacity of the London
Bureau for "united international action."
I have never put a low value on small organizations merely
because they are small. Even here the New Leader twists the
Marxist criterion. Mass organizations have value precisely
because they are mass organizations. Even when they are under
patriotic reformist leadership one cannot discount them. One
must win the masses who are in their clutches: whether from
outside or from inside depends on the circumstance.
Small organizations that regard themselves as selective, as
pioneers, can have value only on the strength of their program
and of the schooling and steeling of their cadres. A small
organization that has no unified program and no really
revolutionary will is less than nothing, is a negative quantity. In
this sense I have spoken very contemptuously of the small groups
in Bulgaria, Rumania, and Poland. Their confusion is really too
big for their small compass. The revolutionary movement is only
injured by them. On the other hand, the smallest of our groups
are valuable because they know what they want and because
they base themselves on the great tradition of Bolshevism with
which they are internationally closely bound. Sooner or later
every one of these groups will show its value.
The Austrian "Red Front," which had united in itself the really
militant worker elements, has apparently merged with the
Revolutionary Socialist Party of Austria, i.e., with the old Austro
Marxist party. 3 2 8 Fenner Brockway's bulletin affirms: "The
united party, although it is affiliated to the Second International,
supports the antiwar policy of the London Bureau."
This representation of Austro-Marxism is utterly wrong and
confusing. Anyone who has read the theses of Messrs. Otto
Bauer, Dan, and Zyromsky knows that Austro-Marxism repre
sents even now nothing but a cowardly, wretched falsification of
Marxism, i.e., has remained completely true to its tradition.
The "Red Front" could accomplish revolutionary work in the
Open Letter to a British Comrade 295
Austro-Marxist party under two closely related conditions: firstly,

it must itself have clear principles; secondly, it must see clearly
the rottenness of Austro-Marxism. Both conditions are completely
missing (incidentally, one might mention that Neue Front, the
organ of the SAP, makes propaganda for Der Kampf, the Austro
Marxist organ). Actually the point is that the "Red Front" is
being absorbed in the Austro-Marxist swamp.
The Norwegian group "Mot-Dag" adopts the point of view of
the Locarno powers329 and is now preparing to be absorbed into
the Labor Party. This group too has been for years nothing but
confusion worse confounded.
It is really hardly worthwhile wasting any more words about
the Italian section (the Maximalists) . It is enough to say that this
"revolutionary" organization, together with the Italian Socialist
Party (Second International) and the Italian Communist Party
(Third International), has signed a common appeal in which it
calls on the League of Nations to widen sanctions, and tries to
instill into the Italian people the notion that imperialist sanctions
are a "means to peace." Perhaps Fenner Brockway does not know
of this appeal? Let him become acquainted with it. And if he does
know why does he treat these people as revolutionary friends and
not as traitors to proletarian internationalism?
The policy article of the New Leader maintains that the
Swedish Socialist Party feels itself more closely connected with
the London Bureau than I have maintained. It is quite possible
that this connection has recently become somewhat closer. But
that the Swedish Socialist Party has an internationalist
attitude-that is either a n aive or a consciously false rumor. It is
of course antiwar and it declares itself to be anti-League of
Nations. But its "fight" against war leads it hand in hand with
the peace organizations in the form of petitions. One could with
the same success hold divine services for peace. But this method
of action, which manifests a shrieking contradiction between
goal and method, is enough to make us understand that the
leaders of the Swedish Socialist Party, with all their phraseology,
which by the way changes very easily, are pacifistic philistines
and certainly not proletarian revolutionaries. The peace policy of
Kilborn, like that of Schwab, is in the final analysis a small
edition of the policy of Lord Cecil.330 Every important event in
Sweden will confirm this explanation.
The ILP cannot and will not admit that the Swedish party is an
anti-Marxist organization, because its own leadership shows that
it itself is a pacifist centrist party through and through. We have
heartily welcomed the series of truly revolutionary New Leader
articles about sanctions (see Unser Wort, nos_ 67 and 68) without
any of those mental reservations with which the critic has
reproached us_ But one swallow does not make a summer. And
even these articles bestow no Marxist halo upon the ILP. Max
ton and the others remain what they were-petty-bourgeois
pacifists-and they decide the party's course today, as yesterday.
May I be permitted to point out that I publicly warned the ILP
more than two years ago against the sterile alliance with the
Communist Party of Great Britain, as this alliance only
multiplies the defects of both parties and diverts the attention of
the ILP from the workers' mass organizations. Were these
warnings right or not? The Communist Party of Great Britain is
ending in the swamp of opportunism. But the ILP is now
politically weaker than ever, and its own ideas remam as
indefinite and hazy as they were two years ago.
Lastly, a few more words about what the New Leader says
concerning the organizations of the Fourth International: it calls
them "the merest cliques." In this characterization ignorance
surpasses dishonesty. Clique is the word used by us Marxists for
a group of individuals who have neither program nor high aim
but who cluster around a leader in order to satisfy personal and
certainly not praiseworthy desires. ("Sect," on the other hand, is
the designation of a group with definite ideas and methods.)
"Clique" also implies lack of honor. Does the New Leader believe
that our parties, organizations, and groups possess no principles,
no program, and no revolutionary consciousness? It would be
really interesting to hear this some time from Maxton or Fenner
Brockway. On our side we maintain: we are the only internation
al organization which has developed in a struggle of many years
an absolutely definite program, which momentous events confirm
and strengthen every day. The passion with which all our
organizations enter into discussion in order to clarify all the
questions of the international workers' movement, the indepen
dence with which they develop their opinions, proves how
seriously they understand Marxism and how many miles distant
they are from an unprincipled clique spirit.
According to figures, too, they do not stand in any way inferior
to the organizations around the London Bureau. A short time ago
I proved, using the official Soviet press, that in the last few
months of the year 1 935 about 20,000 Bolshevik-Leninists had
been expelled from the official Communist Party. I believe that in
the Soviet Union alone we have more followers than the London
Bureau has in the whole world. According to figures, the Dutch
Open Letter to a British Comrade 297
party stands hardly inferior to the ILP. We have a courageous

and militant section in France, the focal point of European
politics. Although the French comrades of the Fourth Interna
tional have no representative in parliament they play a much
more important part today in French political life. The fascist
and capitalist press of France is an irrefutable proof of this. And
this is not to be wondered at: the Bolshevik-Leninists put forward
in a revolutionary situation a really revolutionary program. It is
true that our former Spanish section has declined into the worst
opportunism. But why? Because it has fused with the Spanish
section of the London Bureau in order to pursue "big politics" in
the tow of Mr. Azana.331 Our friends in Belgium have fought their
way to a significant influence. Even in South America we have
important and growing sections. Our American section, which
has now joined the Socialist Party, has gained within it
considerable sympathy for its ideas. Incidentally, it seems to me
that the banner of the Fourth International has some supporters
even inside the ILP. And the number of these is systematically
increasing.
The difference between the London Bureau and the association
of the Fourth International is as follows. In the former case it is a
question of different, hybrid organizations with quite a different
past, different ideas, and a different future, which, being without
a roof, have temporarily associated themselves with the Interna
tional London Bureau. In contrast to this, the sections of the
Fourth International are selective bodies which came into
existence on the basis of quite definite ideas and methods worked
out in the struggle with the Second and Third Internationals and
the London Bureau. That is the reason why we increase
systematically in spite of enormous difficulties, why the influence
of the Fourth International grows stronger and stronger, why the
two old Internationals have entered into a holy alliance against
it, and why, when all is said and done, the sections of the London
Bureau associate themselves everywhere with this holy alliance.
The article in the New Leader is only one of the many proofs of
these facts.
With the same certitude with which we some years ago warned
the ILP against the alliance with the Communist Party of Great
Britain, we affirm today that the ILP under its present leadership
and on its present course is marching directly toward the abyss.
We are at the same time no less certain that the best elements of
the English workers' movement will group themselves around the
standard of the Fourth International, for it is now the only
banner of the proletarian revolution.
A GOOD OMEN FOR JOINT WORK
IN BRIT AIN332
April 9, 1936
To Comrade Jack and Comrades
Dear Comrades :
Your letter of March 3 1 , 1936, really delighted me as a good
omen for successful j oint work in the country itself and also in
the international field.
I will not here go into the past, for I must admit that in the
history of the split the former member of the IS, Witte, who has
long since left us, played a rather malignant role.333
The most important points which I take from your letter are the
following:
(a) You remain fully on the basis of the principles and policy of
the Bolshevik-Leninists.
(b) You will work as a faction within the Labour Party on the
basis of the Open Letter for the Fourth International, though not
openly, owing to the police regime of the Labour bureaucracy.
(c) You are ready to set up a contact committee with the
Marxist Group, by means of which, through active j oint work, to
prepare a real fusion as soon as possible.
(d) You wish to enter at once into regular connection with the
IS.
I am now passing on our correspondence to the IS and I am
sure that the IS will only welcome these proposals, just as I
welcome them. I hope that from now on j oint work will proceed
actively and successfully.
To get down to business at once, I wish to ask you a question
about the Socialist League. Do you regard it as fitting for our
comrades to work in the Socialist League, i.e., under the banner of
Messrs. Cripps and Company? I am, of course, far from
sufficiently well informed about the situation inside the Labour
Party and the Socialist League. So far as I know, however, Sir
298
A Good Omen for Joint Work in Britain 299
Cripps is an utterly confused eccentric who flirts with the

revolution one day and the next day crawls on his belly before the
king. The Socialist League is not a mass organization but a
faction, i.e., a selection in the likeness of Mr. Cripps himself. All
experience indicates that one can work with success in a mass
organization as an independent group, opposing each and every
centrist faction. But if one enters a centrist faction then one loses
one's own physiognomy and deprives oneself of the power to
carry on real revolutionary work among the masses. I should be
grateful to have clarification on this question.
Work among young people seems to me to be the most
important and promising field for the Fourth International. In
this field it is to be hoped that joint work with the Marxist Group
may be begun at once!
With best wishes,
THE NEW CONSTITUTION
OF THE USSR334
April 16, 1936
The Abolition of Soviets
Behind the Kremlin walls, work is going on to replace the

Soviet constitution with a new one, which, according to the
declarations of Stalin, Molotov, and others, will be the "most
democratic in the world." To be sure, doubts might be aroused by
the procedure by which the constitution is being elaborated. Until
recently, there has been no mention of this great reform, either in
the press or at meetings. No one is acquainted with the draft of
the constitution as yet. In the meantime, Stalin told the American
interviewer Roy Howard, on March 1 , 1 936, that "We shall
probably adopt our new constitution at the end of this year."
Thus Stalin is informed of the exact date of adoption of this
constitution, about which the people still have practically no
information. It is impossible not to conclude that the "most
democratic constitution in the world" is being elaborated and
introduced in a manner that is not entirely democratic.
Stalin confirmed to Howard, and through him also to the
peoples of the USSR, that "according to the new constitution,
suffrage will be universal, equal, direct, and secret."
The inequalities in suffrage rights in favor of the workers
against the peasants are to be abolished. Henceforth, obviously,
not factories but citizens will vote, each one for himself. Once
there are "no classes," then all members of society are equal.
Individuals can be disenfranchised only by the courts. All these
principles are entirely derived from that very same program of
bourgeois democracy which the soviets in their time came to
replace. The party always held that the soviet system was a
higher form of democracy. The soviet system was to wither away
together with the dictatorship of the proletariat, of which it was
the expression. The question of the new constitution therefore
300
The New Constitution of the USSR 301
boils down to another and more fundamental question: Will the

dictatorship continue to become "stronger" from now on, as is
demanded by all the official speeches and articles, or will it begin
to soften, weaken, and "wither away"? The meaning of the new
constitution can be correctly appraised only in the light of this
perspective. Let us immediately add here that the perspective
itself does not at all depend upon the measure of Stalinist
liberalism but upon the actual structure of the transitional Soviet
society.
In explaining the reform, Pravda refers obscurely and not at all
prudently to the party program written by Lenin in 1 9 1 9, which
does really state that ". .. disenfranchisemnt and any restric
tions whatsoever upon liberty are necessary solely as temporary
measures of struggle against the attempts of the exploiters to
maintain or to restore their privileges. In proportion as the
objective possibility for the exploitation of man by man
disappears, all necessity for these temporary measures will
likewise disappear, and the party will strive to narrow them
down, and to completely abolish them" (our emphasis). These
lines can no doubt serve to justify the refusal to "disenfranchise"
in a society in which the possibility for exploitation has
disappeared. But along with this the program demands the
simultaneous abolition of "any restrictions whatsoever upon
liberty." For the entry into socialist society is characterized not
by the peasants being made equal with the workers, and not by
returning the franchise to the 3-5 percent of the citizens who are
of bourgeois origin, but by the establishment of true liberty for
100 percent of the population. With the abolition of classes,
according to Lenin, and according to Marx, not only the
dictatorship but also the state itself withers away. Stalin,
however, has said nothing as yet about removing "restrictions
upon liberty" either to Howard or to the peoples of the USSR.
Molotov hastened to Stalin's assistance, not, sad to say, very
propitiously. In replying to a question of the editor-in-chief of le
Temps, Molotov said, "Now not infrequently (?) there is already
no need for those administrative measures which were employed
formerly," but "the Soviet power must of course be strong and
consistent in the struggle against terrorists and wreckers of
public property. . . ." Ergo: "a Soviet power"-without soviets; a
proletarian dictatorship-without the proletariat; and, in addition
to that, a dictatorship not against the bourgeoisie, but against
. . . terrorists and thieves. At all events, the party program never
foresaw such a type of state.
Molotov's promise to do "not infrequently" without those

extreme measures which might prove unnecessary is not worth
much even by itself; but it loses all its value alongside of the
reference to the enemies of law and order, who are precisely the
ones that make it impossible to renounce emergency measures.
Whence, however, arise these enemies of law and order, these
terrorists and thieves, and, moreover in such threatening
numbers as would justify the preservation of a dictatorship in a
classless society? Here we must come to the assistance of
Molotov. At the dawn of Soviet power the terrorist acts were
perpetuated by the SR's and the Whites in the atmosphere of the
still unfinished civil war. When the former ruling classes lost all
their hopes, terrorism disappeared as well. Kulak terror, traces of
which are observable even now, was always local in character,
and supplemented the partisan war against the Soviet regime.
This is not what Molotov has in mind. The new terror does not
lean upon either the old ruling classes or the kulak. The terrorists
of recent years are recruited exclusively from among the Soviet
youth, from the ranks of the Young Communists and the party.
While utterly impotent to solve those tasks which it sets itself,
individual terror is, however, of the greatest symptomatic
importance because it characterizes the sharpness of the
antagonism between the bureaucracy and the broad masses of
the people, especially the younger generation. Terrorism is the
tragic supplement of Bonapartism. Each individual bureaucrat is
afraid of the terror; but the bureaucracy as a whole successfully
exploits it for the justification of its political monopoly. Stalin
and Molotov did not discover any gunpowder in this field either.
Worst of all, however, is the fact that it is absolutely impossible
to gather, either from the interviews or from the commentaries,
the social nature of the state for which the new constitution is
being prepared. The soviet system used to be officially considered
as the expression of the dictatorship of the proletariat. But if the
classes have been destroyed, then by reason of this very fact the
social basis of the dictatorship has likewise been destroyed. Who,
then, is its carrier now? Obviously the population as a whole. But
when the entire people, emancipated from class contradictions,
becomes the carrier of the dictatorship, this implies nothing else
than the dissolution of the dictatorship into the socialist society,
and consequently the liquidation of the state. The logic of
Marxism is invulnerable. The liquidation of the state in its turn
begins with the liquidation of the bureaucracy. Does the new
constitution, perhaps, imply at least the liquidation of the GPU?
Should anyone venture to express this idea in the USSR, the GPU
would immediately find convincing counter-arguments. The
classes have been destroyed, the soviets are being abolished, the
class theory of society is reduced to dust, but the bureaucracy
remams. QED.
The Whip Against the Bureaucracy
We shall return later to the question of the extent to which

universal, equal, and direct suffrage corresponds to the social
equality that all citizens have allegedly attained. But if we accept
this premise on faith, we become all the more perplexed by the
following question: Why, if that is the case, must the elections be
secret henceforth? Just whom does the populace in the socialist
country fear? Against whose attempts in particular is it
necessary to provide a defense? The child's fear of darkness has a
purely biological foundation; but when grown-up people dare not
express their opinions openly, their fear is political in character.
And for the Marxist, politics is always a function of the class
struggle. In capitalist society the secret ballot is intended to
provide a defense for the exploited against the terror of the
exploiters. That the bourgeoisie did finally agree to such a
reform-of course, under the pressure of the masses-was only
because the bourgeoisie itself was interested in protecting its
state at least partially against the demoralization of its own
making. But in the USSR there obviously cannot be any pressure
of the exploiters upon the toilers. Against whom, then, is it
necessary to protect the Soviet citizens by means of the secret
ballot?
Under the old Soviet constitution, the vote by show of hands
was introduced as a weapon in the hands of the revolutionary
class against bourgeois and petty-bourgeois enemies. The same
purpose was served by the restrictions in the franchise itself.
Now, at the end of the second decade after the revolution, no
longer the class enemies but the toilers themselves are so
frightened that they cannot vote except under the shield of
secrecy. This concerns precisely the masses of the people, the
overwhelming majority, for it is impossible to allow that the
secret ballot is being especially introduced for the convenience of
the counterrevolutionary minority!
But who is terrorizing the people? The answer is clear-the
bureaucracy. It is preparing to protect the toilers against itself by
means of the secret ballot. Stalin made this admission openly. To
the question, "Why the secret ballot?" his reply was verbatim as
follows: "Because we want to give the Soviet people complete
freedom to vote for those they want to elect." Thus we learn from
Stalin that the "Soviet people" cannot vote today for those they
want to elect. "We" are only getting ready to provide them with
such an opportunity. Who are these "we" who can give or refuse
the freedom to vote? The stratum in whose name Stalin speaks
and acts: the bureaucracy. Stalin need only have added that his
important admission applies as much to the party as to the state,
and that, in particular, he himself occupies the post of general
secretary by means of a system which does not permit party
members to elect those they desire. The phrase "We want to give
the Soviet people" is in itself infinitely more important than all
the constitutions Stalin has yet to write, for this brief phrase is a
ready-made constitution, and, moreover, a very real one, not a
myth.
Like the European bourgeoisie in its time, so the Soviet
bureaucracy today is compelled to resort to the secret ballot in
order at least partially to purge its state apparatus, which it
exploits "as the rightful owner," from the corruption of its own
making. Stalin was compelled to give an inkling of this motive
for the reform. Said he to Howard, "There are not a few
institutions in our country which work badly . . . . Secret suffrage
in the USSR will be a whip in the hands of the population
against the organs of government, which work badly." A second
noteworthy admission! After the bureaucracy has created with its
own hands the socialist society, it feels the need . . . of a whip
not only because the organs of government "work badly," but
above all because they are corroded through and through with
the vices of uncontrolled cliques.
As far back as 1 928, Rakovsky wrote the following with regard
to a number of horrible cases of bureaucratic demoralization that
broke out into the open: "The most characteristic and most
dangerous feature in the tidal wave of scandals is the passivity of
the masses, among the Communists even more than among the
nonparty people, toward the manifestations of unheard-of
arbitrariness, of which the workers themselves were witnesses.
Out of fear of those who wield power, or simply out of political
indifference, they passed by without a protest, or confined
themselves merely to grumbling." 335 More than eight years have
elapsed since that time, and the situation has become infinitely
worse. Stalin's autocratic rule has erected nepotism, arbitrari
ness, profligacy, pillage, and bribery into a system of administra-
The New Con stitution of the USSR 305
tion. The decay of the apparatus, cropping out at every step, has
begun to threaten the very existence of the state as the source of
power, income, and privileges of the ruling stratum. A reform
became necessary. Taking fright at their own handiwork, the
chiefs of the Kremlin turn to the population with a plea to help it
cleanse and straighten out the apparatus of administration.
Democracy Without Politics
Turning to the people for the salutary whip, the bureaucracy,

however, lays down one ultimatistic condition: that there be no
politics. This holy function must remain as hitherto the monopoly
of the "Leader." To the ticklish question of the American
interlocutor relative to other parties, Stalin replied: "Since there
are no classes, since the dividing lines between classes are being
obliterated ("there are no classes"-"the dividing lines between
classes [which do not exist!] are being obliterated"-L.T.) there
remains only a slight, but not a fundamental, difference between
various strata in socialist society, and there can be no fertile soil
for the creation of contending parties. Where there are not several
classes there cannot be several parties, for a party is a part of a
class." Every word a mistake, sometimes even two!
According to Stalin, it seems that the dividing lines between
classes are rigidly described, and that in every given period only
one party corresponds to each class. The Marxist doctrine of the
class nature of parties is transformed into a ludicrous bureaucrat
ic caricature: political dynamics is entirely excluded from the
historical process-in the interests of administrative order. In
point of fact not a single instance can be found throughout the
entire extent of political history of only one party corresponding
to one class! Classes are not homogeneous; they are torn by
internal antagonisms, and they arrive even at the solution of
common tasks only through an internal struggle of tendencies,
groupings, and parties. Within certain limits it may be allowed
that "the party is a part of a class." But inasmuch as a class has
many "parts" -some facing forward, others backward-one and
the same class can put forth several parties. For the same reason,
a single party can lean upon the parts of several classes.
Remarkably enough, this scandalous mistake of Stalin is
absolutely disinterested in character, for, you see, in relation to
the USSR he proceeds from the assertion that no classes at all
exist there. Of what class is the CPSU a part-after the abolition
of all classes? Carelessly straying into the field of theory, Stalin
proves more than he intended. From his reasoning it follows not

that there cannot be different parties in the USSR, but that there
cannot be even a single party. Where there are no classes there
can be no room for politics in general. Stalin, however, makes a
gracious exception from this law in the case of the party of which
he is general secretary.
The history of the working class reveals best of all the
bankruptcy of the Stalinist theory of parties. Despite the fact that
the working class is in its social structure indubitably the least
heterogeneous of all classes in capitalist society, the existence of
such a "stratum" as the labor aristocracy and a labor bureaucra
cy bound up with it leads to the creation of reformist parties,
which inevitably tum into one of the instruments of bourgeois
rule. It matters nothing from the standpoint of Stalinist sociology
whether the difference between the labor aristocracy and the
proletarian mass is "fundamental" or only "slight"; but it was
precisely by reason of this difference that the necessity to create
the Third International arose in its time. On the other hand, it is
indubitable that the structure of Soviet society is infinitely more
heterogeneous and complex than that of the proletariat in
capitalist countries. For this very reason, it can provide a
sufficiently fertile soil for several parties.
Stalin is interested, as a matter of fact, not in the sociology of
Marx but in the monopoly of the bureaucracy. These are two
entirely different things. Every labor bureaucracy, even one that
does not wield state power, inclines to the view that there is no
"fertile soil" in the working class for the opposition. The leaders
of the British Labour Party drive the revolutionists out of the
trade unions on the grounds that there is no room for the struggle
between parties within the framework of a "united" working
class. Messrs. Vandervelde, Leon Blum, Jouhaux, etc., act in a
similar manner. Their conduct is dictated not by the metaphysics
of unity but by the egoistic interests of the privileged cliques. The
Soviet bureaucracy is infinitely more powerful, wealthy, and self
reliant than the labor bureaucracy in bourgeois countries. Highly
skilled workers in the Soviet Union enjoy privileges unknown to
the highest categories of labor in Europe and America. This
twofold stratum-the bureaucracy which leans upon the labor
aristocracy-is the ruler of the country. The present ruling party
of the USSR is nothing else than the political machine of a
privileged stratum. The Stalinist bureaucracy has something to
lose and nothing more to conquer. It is not inclined to share what
it holds. For the future as well, it intends to reserve the "fertile
soil" for itself.
To be sure, the Bolshevik Party also occupied a monopoly

position in the state during the first period of the Soviet era.
However, to identify these two phenomena is to mistake
appearances for reality. During the years of civil war, under
extremely difficult historical conditions, the party of the Bolshe
viks found itself compelled temporarily to prohibit other parties,
not because the latter lacked a "fertile soil"-in that case it would
not have been necessary even to prohibit them-but on the
contrary, precisely because fertile soil existed: this is what made
them dangerous. The party explained openly to the masses what
it was doing, for it was clear to everybody that at stake was the
defense of the isolated revolution against mortal dangers. Today,
the more the bureaucracy embellishes the social reality, the more
shamelessly it exploits it for its own benefit. If it be true that the
kingdom of socialism has already come, and the fertile soil for
political parties has disappeared, there would be no need to
prohibit them. It would only remain, in accordance with the
program, to abolish "any restrictions whatsoever upon liberty."
But the bureaucracy will not allow so much as a peep about such
a constitution. The internal falseness of the whole construction is
all too apparent!
Seeking to dispel normal doubts on the part of his interlocutor,
Stalin offered a new thought: "Candidates will be put forward not
only by the Communist Party but by all sorts of public, nonparty
organizations. And we have hundreds of these. . . . Each of these
strata (of Soviet society) may have its special interests and
express them through our numerous existing organizations."
Evidently, it is for this reason that the new Soviet constitution
will be the "most democratic constitution in the world."
This piece of sophistry is no better than the rest. The most
important "strata" in Soviet society are: the summits of the
bureaucracy and its middle and nethermost layers, the labor
aristocracy, the kolkhoz [collective farm] aristocracy, the common
run of workers, the middle layers of the kolkhozes, the peasant
proprietors, the labor strata of workers and peasants, and beyond
them the lumpenproletariat, the homeless, the prostitutes, and so
on.As to the Soviet public organizations-trade union, coopera
tive, cultural, sport, etc.-they do not at all represent the interests
of different "strata" because they all have one and the same
hierarchic structure. Even in those cases when the organizations
are based upon privileged circles, as for instance the trade unions
and cooperatives, the active role in them is played exclusively by
the representatives of the privileged summits, while the "party,"
i.e., the political organization of the ruling stratum, has the last
word. The participation of nonpolitical organizations in the

electoral struggle will consequently lead to nothing else than
rivalry between the different cliques of the bureaucracy within
the limits set by the Kremlin. The ruling summit calculates to
learn in this manner some secrets hidden from it and to refurbish
its regime, without at the same time permitting a political
struggle which must inevitably be directed against itself.
The Historical Meaning

of the New Constitution
In the person of its most authoritative leader, the bureaucracy

again demonstrates how little it understands those historical
tendencies which determine its movement. When Stalin remarks
that the difference between various strata in Soviet society is
"slight but not fundamental," he obviously has in mind the fact
that exclusive of the individual peasant proprietors, who are
sufficiently numerous even today to populate Czechoslovakia, all
other "strata" depend upon the statified or collectivized means of
production. This is beyond dispute. But a "fundamental"
difference still remains between the collective, i.e., group property
in agriculture and the nationalized property in industry: it can
still make itself felt in the future. We shall not, however, enter
into a discussion of this important question. Of considerably
more immediate importance is the difference between the "strata"
which is determined by their relation not to the means of
production but to the articles of consumption. The sphere of
distribution is, of course, only a "superstructure" in relation to
the sphere of production. However, it is precisely the sphere of
distribution that is of decisive importance in the everyday life of
the people. From the standpoint of the ownership of the means of
production, the difference between a marshal and a street cleaner,
between the head of a trust and an unskilled laborer, between the
son of a peoples' commissar and a homeless waif, is not
"fundamental." But some occupy lordly apartments, enjoy
several dachas (summer homes) in various parts of the country,
have the best automobiles at their disposal, and have long since
forgotten how to shine their own boots; while others not
infrequently live in wooden barracks, without any partitions for
privacy, lead a half-starved existence, and do not clean their own
boots only because they are barefoot. To a high dignitary this
difference seems to be only "slight," i.e., one that does not merit
attention. To the unskilled laborer it appears, not without reason,
to be "fundamental."
In addition to the terrorists , according to Molotov, the object of

the dicatatorship in the USSR is the thief. But the very
abundance of people of such a profession is a sure sign of the
want that reigns in society. Where the material level of the
overwhelming majority is so low that the ownership of bread and
boots must be protected by firing squads, speeches about the
alleged achievement of socialism sound like an infamous
mockery of human beings!
In a truly homogeneous society, in which the normal wants of
the citizens are satisfied without rancor and brawls, not only
Bonapartist absolutism but bureaucracy in general would be
inconceivable. The bureaucracy is not a technical but a social
category. Every single bureaucracy originates in and maintains
itself upon the heterogeneous nature of society, upon the
antagonism of interests and the internal struggle. It regulates the
social antagonisms in the interests of the privileged classes or
layers, and exacts an enormous tribute for this from the toilers.
This very same function, despite the great revolution in property
relations, is being fulfilled, with cynicism and not without
success, by the Soviet bureaucracy.
The latter raised itself on the NEP, exploiting the antagonism
between the kulak and the NEPman, on the one hand, and the
workers and peasants, on the other. When the kulak, grown
strong, raised his hand against the bureaucracy itself, the latter,
in the interests of self-defense, was compelled to lean directly
upon the rank and file at the bottom. The bureaucracy was the
weakest of all during the years of the struggle against the kulak
(1929-32). Precisely for this reason, it zealously set about the
formation of a labor and kolkhoz aristocracy: instituting a
shocking difference in wage scales, bonuses, badges, and other
similar measures which are called forth one-third by economic
necessity and two-thirds by the political interests of the
bureaucracy. Upon this new and ever deepening social antago
nism, the ruling caste has exalted itself to its present Bonapartist
heights.
In a country in which the lava of revolution has not cooled, the
privileged are often very much afraid of their own privileges,
especially against the background of general want. The topmost
Soviet strata stand in dread of the masses, with a fear that is
purely bourgeois. Stalin supplies the growing privileges of the
ruling stratum with a "theoretical" justification by means of the
Comintern, and he defends the Soviet aristocracy against
dissatisfaction by means of concentration camps. Stalin is the
indisputable leader of the bureaucracy and of the labor aris-
tocracy. He keeps in constant touch only with these "strata." A

sincere "worship" of the Leader emanates only from these circles.
Such is the essence of the present political system of the USSR.
But to maintain this mechanism, Stalin is compelled from time
to time to side with the "people" as against the bureaucracy,
naturally, with the latter's silent consent. He is even compelled to
seek a whip from below against the abuses from above. As we
have already said, this is one of the motives for the constitutional
reform. There is another and no less important motive.
The new constitution abolishes the soviets, dissolving the
workers into the general mass of the population. The soviets, it is
true, have long since lost their political meaning. But they might
have revived with the growth of new social antagonisms and
with the awakening of the new generation. Above all, of course,
are to be feared the city soviets, with the growing participation of
fresh and exacting Young Communists. In the cities the contrast
between luxury and dire want is all too glaring. The first care of
the Soviet aristocracy is to get rid of the workers and Red Army
soviets.
Despite the collectivization, the material and cultural contradic
tion between the city and the village has hardly been touched.
The peasantry is still very backward and atomized. Social
antagonisms also exist within the kolkhozes and between the
kolkhozes. The bureaucracy finds it much easier to cope with
dissatisfaction in the village. It is able to use the kolkhozniks not
without success against the city workers. To smother the protest
of the workers against the growing social inequality by the
weight of the more backward masses of the village-this is the
chief aim of the new constitution, about which neither Stalin nor
Molotov naturally has communicated anything to the world.
Bonapartism, incidentally, always leans upon the village as
against the city. In this, too, Stalin remains true to tradition.
Learned philistines like the Webbs failed to see any great
difference between Bolshevism and czarism prior to 1923, but, in
return, they have completely recognized the "democracy" of
Stalin's regime.336 Small wonder: these people have all their lives
been the ideologues of a labor bureaucracy. In point of fact,
Soviet Bonapartism bears the same relation to Soviet democracy
that bourgeois Bonapartism or even fascism bears to bourgeois
democracy. Both arise equally from the frightful defeats of the
world proletariat. Both will crash with its first victory.
Bonapartism, as history testifies, is able to abide very well with
universal and even secret suffrage. The democratic ritual of
Bonapartism is the plebiscite. From time t o time the question is

put to the citizens: For or against the Leader? The Leader, on his
part, takes precautions so that the voter is able to feel the barrel
of a gun at his temple.Since the days of Napoleon III, who now
looks like a provincial dilettante, this technique has attained an
unprecedented development, as witness, say, the latest spectacle
by Goebbels.The new constitution is thus intended to liquidate
juridically the outworn Soviet regime, replacing it by Bonapart
ism on a plebiscitary basis.
Tasks of the Vanguard
Drawing profounder conclusions from Stalin, Molotov told the

editor of le Temps that the question of parties in the USSR is "not
a vital question as we are closely approaching the complete
liquidation of . . . classes." What precision in ideas and ter
minology! In the year 1931, they liquidated the "last capitalist
class, that of the kulaks," and in the year 1936 they are "closely
approaching" the liquidation of classes. For better or for worse,
the question of parties is not a "vital" one to Molotov. Entirely
different, however, are the views held upon this matter by those
workers who know that the bureaucracy, while suppressing the
exploiting classes with one hand, prepares for their rebirth with
the other. For these advanced workers the question of their own
party, independent of the bureaucracy, is the most vital of all
questions. Stalin and Molotov understand this very well indeed:
not for nothing have they expelled during the last few months
from the so-called Communist Party of the Soviet Union several
tens of thousands of Bolshevik-Leninists, i.e., in reality, an entire
revolutionary p arty.
When the editor of le Temps politely put the question about
factions and their possible transformation into independerit
parties, Molotov replied, with the quick wit for which he is so
noted: "In the party .. . attempts were made to create special
factions . . .but it is now several years since the situation in this
respect has fundamentally changed and the Communist Party is
truly united. " Best of all, he might have added, this is proved by
the interminable purges and concentration camps.However, the
illegal existence of an opposition party is not nonexistence, but
only a difficult form of existence.Arrests may prove very effective
against the p arties of a class that is departing from the historical
stage: the revolutionary dictatorship of the years 1917-23 has
proved this fully. But the arrests aimed against the revolutionary
vanguard will not save the outlived bureaucracy, which accord

ing to its own admission requires a "whip."
It is a lie and a triple lie to allege that socialism has been
realized in the USSR. The flowering of bureaucratism is barbaric
proof that socialism is still far removed. So long as the
productivity of labor in the USSR is several times below that of
the advanced capitalist countries; so long as the people have not
emerged from want; so long as a cruel struggle continues to be
waged for articles of consumption; so long as the individualistic
bureaucracy can strum with impunity upon social antagonisms
just so long will the danger of bourgeois restoration retain its full
force. At the present time, with the growth of inequality on the
basis of economic successes, the danger has even been increased.
In this and in this alone lies the justification for the need of state
power. But the bureaucratically degenerated state has itself
become the chief danger to the socialist future. Inequality can be
reduced to its economically inevitable limits at the given stage,
and a road can be cut to socialist equality, only by the active
political control of the toilers, beginning with their vanguard.
The regeneration of the party of the Bolsheviks in counterposi
tion to the party of the Bonapartists is the key to all other
difficulties and tasks.
On the road toward a goal, one must be able to utilize the real
possibilities which arise at every stage. Any illusions about the
Stalinist constitution would of course be out of place. But it is
equally impermissible to wave it aside as an insignificant trifle.
The bureaucracy assumes the risk of a reform not at its own
whim but out of necessity. History tells of many cases of a
bureaucratic dictatorship resorting for its salvation to "liberal"
reforms, and still further weakening itself. By laying bare
Bonapartism, the new constitution creates a semilegal cover for
the struggle against it. The rivalry between the bureaucratic
cliques can become the opening for a much wider political
struggle. The whip against "government institutions that work
badly" can be turned into a whip against Bonapartism.
Everything depends upon the degree of activity of the advanced
elements of the working class.
The Bolshevik-Leninists must henceforth follow attentively all
the twists and turns of the constitutional reform, painstakingly
taking into consideration the experience of the first coming
elections. We must learn how to utilize the rivalry between the
various "public organizations" in the interests of socialism. We
must learn how to engage in battles on the subject of the
plebiscites as well. The bureaucracy is afraid of the workers; we

must unfold our work among them more audaciously and on a
more extensive scale.Bonapartism is afraid of the youth; we must
rally it to the banner of Marx and Lenin. From the adventures of
individual terrorism, the method of those who are desperate, we
must lead the vanguard of the young generation onto the broad
road of the world revolution. It is necessary to train new
Bolshevik cadres which will come to replace the decaying
bureaucratic regime.
IN THE COLUMNS OF PRAVDA337
Published May 1936
Ever drawing newer and newer balance sheets of the so-called

"checkup of party documents," Pravda is convinced that the
behind-the-scenes purge takes the palm over the open purge. It
turns out that "mimy of the disguised enemies were able to fool
the purging committee, and in some places they even passed
through the purge with applause." In other words, this is to say
that many of those suspected of being oppositionists had the
sympathies of their organizations with them, and the committees,
appointed from above, had no pretext for expulsion. But in the
behind-the-scenes checkup "the study of the party personnel was
much deeper and more many-sided than during the purges"
(Pravda, March 22). This is hardly to be wondered at; the
searchlight here was the apparatus of the GPU.
We learn from Pravda, in passing, that in one of the Chelya

binsk factories "to the 103 Communists there are 3 1 8 who were
expelled from the party at one time or another." In other words,
three times as many have been expelled as have remained. The
Chelyabinsk factory is hardly a rare exception. At all events, it
illustrated the manner in which this sorry ruling "party" is
living!
Pravda carries an exposure of the secretary of the Uspensk

District Committee of the Azov-Black Sea region. " His motions
during the session of the district committee-and he introduces
them on every question-do not meet with any objections,
because he does not tolerate any objections." How awful! What a
shocking breach of democracy! Saltykov once wrote a history of
the city of Glupov (Fools City), in which he portrayed the customs
of the entire czarist autocracy. The piece about the Uspensk
District Committee rings like an involuntary satire on the regime.
The name of the U spensk secretary is Saut. But if one were to put
314
In the Columns of Pravda 315
down the USSR in place of the district and replace Saut with
Stalin, one could leave unaltered everything else remaining in the
text.
Molotov has succeeded in completely straightening out the

front. Since the liquidation of the "third period," Molotov, as is
well known, has been in semi-disgrace. His name, it is true, was
to be found among the inborn leaders but not on every occasion.
His name was commonly put after Kaganovich and Voroshilov,
and he was often deprived of his initials. In Soviet ritual all these
are signs of paramount importance. Whenever a delegation
arrived to see Molotov he was allowed to receive them only by
having Rudzutak at his left shoulder and Chubar at his right.33B
On his part, Molotov, though he did give necessary praise to the
Leader, would do so only two or three times throughout an entire
speech, which in the atmosphere of the Kremlin sounded almost
like a call for the overthrow of Stalin. But, with God's help, since
the end of last year, a turn for the better has been noticed.
Molotov was straightening out the front. In recent weeks he has
delivered several panegyrics to Stalin which made Mikoyan
himself turn green with envy. In reward Molotov has received his
initials. His name figures in second place, and he bears the title
of "closest companion-in-arms."
All's well that ends well. But in all decency it must be admitted
that Molotov didn't find it easy. After all, he has known Stalin
for too many years to place him on the same plane with Lenin, as
he did in his debased speech to the delegates from Soviet Georgia.
But, after all, it is not for us to be concerned about Molotov's
dignity as a man. We have other concerns.
During the school term in Kremenchug, on the initiative of a

propagandist named Potelyako, a discussion was instituted on
the "possibility of building Communism in one country," during
which Potelyako "advanced Trotskyist formulations." Despite
the protests of several Communists, (obviously, the Pravda
correspondent himself) "Potelyako was left at his post and
continues to give his lectures. "
But after the correspondent's notice in Pravda, we have reason
to believe, Potelyako was not only removed as lecturer but also
given all the necessary inspiration by the well-known theorist
Yagoda.
Novoseletsky, who received the "best newspaperman" award at

the Ukrainian Communist Institute of Journalism, on arriving at

his new post printed in the newspaper he edited a "Trotskyist
counterrevolutionary article," for which he was expelled from the
party (and, of course, arrested). This episode is a clear testimony
to the upsurge of Oppositionist audacity. We note it with
satisfaction.
In explaining the need for vigilance with respect to "Trotsky

ists," Pravda unburdens itself of a brilliant image which is
worthy of reprinting: "the class enemy in his deathbed death
throes (evidently there are death-throes which are not deathbed)
refuses to surrender. He resorts to all sorts of snares and dirty
devices, especially when there is a lull in vigilance." Thus the
class enemy is terrible not when he defended his privileged
positions with arms in hand at the height of his strength. No! He
is particularly terrible now, "in his deathbed death-throes." His
Most Serene Excellency Prince Potemkin once remarked on a
similar occasion to the litterateur Fonvizin: "You might as well
die, Denis, you will never write anything better."
On December 30, 1935, Pravda indignantly reported that

revolutionists were being subjected to tortures in Yugoslav j ails.
Pravda forgets to mention that Yugoslav revolutionists are
subjected to torture in the j ails of Stalin, also.
From a conversation with a Soviet dignitary (not from Pravda

[Truth], but forsooth the truth).
"Why do you flatter him so shamelessly?"
"What can one do? He loves it so."
ON DICTATORS AND
THE HEIGHTS OF OSL0339
A Letter to an English Comrade
April 22, 1936
Dear Comrade:
It is with great astonishment that I read the report of the
conference of the Independent Labour Party in the New Leader of
April 1 7, 1936.340 I really never entertained any illusions about
the pacifist parliamentarians who run the ILP. But their political
position and their whole conduct at the conference exceed even
those bounds that can usually be expected of them. I am sure that
you and your friends have drawn approximately the same
conclusions as we h ave here. Nevertheless, I cannot refrain from
making several observations.
1. Maxton and the others opine that the Italo-Ethiopian war is
"a conflict between two rival dictators." To these politicians it
appears that this fact relieves the proletariat of the duty of
making a choice between two dictators. They thus define the
character of the war by the political form of the state, in the
course of which they themselves regard this political form in a
quite superficial and purely descriptive manner, without taking
into consideration the social foundations of both "dictatorships."
A dictator can also play a very progressive role in history; for
example, Oliver Cromwell, Robespierre, etc.341 On the other hand,
right in the midst of the English democracy Lloyd George
exercised a highly reactionary dictatorship during the war.
Should a dictator place himself at the head of the n ext uprising of
the Indian people in order to smash the British yoke-would
Maxton then refuse this dictator his support? Yes or no? If not,
why does he refuse his support to the Ethiopian "dictator" who is
attempting to cast off the Italian yoke?
If Mussolini triumphs, it means the reinforcement of fascism,
317
the strengthening of imperialism, and the discouragement of the

colonial peoples in Africa and elsewhere_ The victory of the
Negus, however, would mean a mighty blow not only at Italian
imperialism but at imperialism as a whole, and would lend a
powerful impulsion to the rebellious forces of the oppressed
peoples_ One must really be completely blind not to see this_
2. McGovern puts the "poor little Ethiopia" of 1935 on the same
level with the "poor little Belgium" of 1914; in both cases it
means support of war. Well, "poor little Belgium" has ten million
slaves in Africa, whereas the Ethiopian people are fighting in
order not to be the slaves of Italy. Belgium was and remains a
link of the European imperialist chain. Ethiopia is only a victim
of imperialist appetites . Putting the two cases on the same plane
is the sheerest nonsense.
On the other hand, to take up the defense of Ethiopia against
Italy in no way means to encourage British imperialism to make
war. At one time this is j ust what was very well demonstrated in
several articles in the New Leader. McGovern's conclusion that it
should have been the ILP's task "to stand aside from quarrels
between dictators," is an exemplary model of the spiritual and
moral impotence of p acifism.
3. The most shameful thing of all, however, only comes after
the voting. After the conference had rejected the scandalous
pacifist quackery by a vote of 70 to 57, the tender pacifist Maxton
put the revolver of an ultimatum at the breast of the conference
and forced a new decision by a vote of 93 to 39. So we see that
there are dictators not only in Rome and in Addis Ababa, but also
in London. And of the three dictators, I consider most harmful
the one who grabs his own party by the throat in the name of his
parliamentary prestige and his pacifist confusion. A party that
tolerates such conduct is not a revolutionary party; for if it
surrenders (or "postpones") its principled position on a highly
important and topical question because of threats of resignation
made by Maxton, then at the decisive moment it will never
withstand the immeasurably mightier pressure of the bourgeoisie.
4. By an overwhelming majority, the conference forbade the
existence of groups inside the party. Good! But in whose name did
Maxton put an ultimatum to the conference? In the name of the
parliamentary group which regards the party machine as its
private property and which actually represents the only faction
that should have been sharply beaten into respect for the
democratic decisions of the party. A party which dissolves the
oppositional groups but lets the ruling clique do as it j olly well
On Dictators and the Heights of Oslo 319
pleases is not a revolutionary party. It will not be able to lead the

proletariat to victory.
5. Fenner Brockway's position on this question is a highly
instructive example of the political and moral insufficiency of
centrism. Fenner Brockway was lucky enough to adopt a correct
point of view on an important question, a view that coincides
with ours. The difference lies in this, however, that we Marxists
really mean the thing seriously. To Fenner Brockway, on the
other hand, it is a matter of something "incidental." He believes
it is better for the British workers to have Maxton as chairman
with a false point of view than to have a correct point of view
without Maxton. That is the fate of centrism-to consider the
incidental thing serious and the serious thing incidental. That's
why centrism should never be taken seriously.
6. On the question of the International, the old confusion was
once more approved, despite the obvious bankruptcy of the
previous perspective. In any case, nothing more is said about an
"invitation" from the Third International. But the centrist
doesn't take anything seriously. Even when he now admits that
there is no longer a proletarian International, he nevertheless
hesitates to build one up. Why? Because he has no principles.
Because he can't have any. For if he but once makes the sober
attempt to adopt a principled position on only one important
question, he promptly receives an ultimatum from the right and
starts to back down. How can he think of a rounded-out
revolutionary program under such circumstances? He then
expresses his spiritual and moral helplessness in the form of
profound aphorisms, that the new International must come "from
the development of socialist movements," that is, from the
historical process, which really ought to produce something some
day. This dubious ally has various ways, however: it has even got
to the point of reducing the Lenin International to the level of the
Second. Proletarian revolutionists should therefore strike out on
their own path, that is, work out the program of the new
International and, basing themselves on the favorable tendencies
of the historical process, help this program gain prevalence.
7. Fenner Brockway, after his lamentable capitulation to
Maxton, found his courage again in struggle against the
undersigned. He, Brockway, cannot allow a new International to
be constructed from "the heights of Oslo." I leave aside the fact
that I do not live in Oslo and that, besides, Oslo is not situated on
heights. The principles which I defend in common with many
thousand comrades bear absolutely no local or geographical
320 Writings of L eon Trotsky (1935-36)
character. They are Marxian and international. They are

formulated, expounded, and defended in theses, pamphlets, and
books. If Fenner Brockway finds these principles to be false, let
him put his own up against them. We are always ready to be
taught better. But unfortunately Fenner Brockway cannot
venture into this field, for he has just turned over to Maxton that
oh so paltry parcel of principles. That is why there is nothing left
for him to do save to make merry about the "heights of Oslo,"
wherein he promptly commits a threefold mistake: with respect to
my address, to the topography of the Norwegian capital, and, last
but not least, to the fundamental principles of international
action.
My conclusions? The cause of the ILP seems to me to be

hopeless . The thirty-nine delegates who, despite the failure of the
Fenner Brockway faction, did not surrender to Maxton's
ultimatum must seek ways of preparing a truly revolutionary
party for the British proletariat. It can stand only under the
banner of the Fourth International.
Leon Trotsky
HOW TO WIN THE SOCIALIST YOUTH342
April 2 7 , 1 9 3 6
Dear Comrade:
Unfortunately I could not produce the article you asked for.
First, because of lack of time, and second, because I did not wish
to confine myself to platitudes and I was not really familiar
enough with your activities , plans, and opportunities to comment
on them.
Although I do not know enough about conditions in Holland
(unfortun ately I don 't read Dutch), it seems to me that the maj or
arena for your activities must be the Social Democratic youth and
the reformist trade unio n s , just as was the case a year ago. Of
course, I do not mean by this that your Leninist Youth Guard
has to give up its independence. But to avoid this in the future, it
should have long since built a substantial fraction withirr the
Social Democratic youth. I fear that you have already lost too
much time in doing thi s .
Y o u speak of a separate sports organization a s the point of
departure for the workers ' militia and aptly note: " Ours should be
better than the Social D emocratic sports organizations . " This
correct observation , h owever, lays bare the whole utopian
character of the plan. You are superior to the Social Democracy in
revolutionary ideas, in program, not in financial resources,
technique, or athletic capabilities. Under such circumstances,
how can you build a better sports organization? The same applies
to the trade unions . There are many historical examples of how a
small revolutionary group became an important, even a decisive
political organization. But I know of no instances in which small
groups s uccessfully built competing unions, not to mention sports
organizations . Youth should learn from history in order to avoid
repeating the old mistakes . We need the greatest ideological
steadfastness and the sharpest and clearest revolutionary
thinking not in order to i solate ourselves from the existing mass
organizations in a sectarian manner, but rather in order to work
effectively in their midst without losing our perspective.
32 1
All over the world, the Social Democratic youth is coming into
conflict with the old bosses both in the parties and in the trade
unions. Where the representatives of the Fourth International
take a sectarian-pure, negative approach, the reformist youth
trying to move left fall under the influence of Stalinism. On the
other hand, where our people are not content with admiring their
own purity, but find their place in the mass organizations, there
the leftward-moving youth come into contact with anti-Stalinism,
i.e., Marxism.
In Spain, where our section is carrying out a miserable political
line, the youth, who were just becoming interested in the Fourth
International, were handed over to the Stalinists. In England,
where our people were slow to get involved, the Stalinists have
become the most important force among the Labour Party youth
and we are in second place. In Belgium, our comrades have won
over an important section of the youth, brought the majority into
opposition against Stalinism, and in so doing opened up new
fields of activity for themselves. In Brussels, however, where
Vereecken and his group remained on the sidelines, the left wing
of the Labor Party as well as the youth have fallen under the
influence of the Stalinists. In America, where our comrades have
carried out a very correct political line, they have already won
over a significant section of the Social Democratic youth. Anyone
who refuses to consider these facts is bound to make nothing but
mistakes.
What you, dear comrade, s a y about the American party i s
based o n incorrect information. Our people are already i n the
Socialist organizations. It is only the leadership which has not
yet joined, for tactical reasons. And it is possible that even this
step has already been taken. Our American comrades have taken
a very bold step. They are so determined and so sure of
themselves that they look to the future with the greatest
confidence and even the bitterest former opponents [of entry]
have taken up their work in the Socialist Party with enthusiasm.
They all hope that our ideas will win over not a minority but a
majority of the party. Naturally, from this vantage point I cannot
form an independent opinion, but I know our American friends
well enough and have complete confidence in them, particularly
now that they have carried out the entry with such decisiveness
and unanimity. Our Dutch comrades would do better to criticize
the American experience less and attempt to learn from it more,
so that they can adapt it to conditions in their own country.
What you write on the subj ect of "forming blocs with the youth
How to Win the Socialist Youth 323
organizations" seems to me-I must admit-not very convincing.

Large organizations seldom enter into blocs with small group
ings, and quite rightly so. On the other hand, playing around
with blocs is of no practical value for the smaller groups, as our
Belgian experience has adequately demonstrated. If the leaders of
an organization of a few hundred young people meet once or
twice a month with the leaders of the mass organizations, this
may perhaps flatter their vanity, but it opens up no practical
opportunities. One must win the ranks away from the leaders and
not engage in diplomacy with the leaders.
Best greetings,
Yours,
L. Trotsky
P.S.-You have interpreted Comrade Braun's letter to mean

that it is necessary to build an independent party in Belgium,
whatever the cost, just for the sake of its independence. However,
this is not at all the case. Our comrades in Charleroi gave up
formal independence for a time in order to broaden their field of
activity. They scored unquestionable successes. But since they
acted like revolutionaries and not like opportunists, a political
conflict of great importance arose. It is now a matter of seeing
this through to the end. For although we are not sectarians who
in no case (ever and anywhere) wish to enter the reformist
organizations, neither are we SAPists, who as soon as they are in
the mass organizations refuse to leave them under any condi
tions, that is, are ready to sacrifice what is left of their political
principles. One must appreciate the deeper meaning of the words
to maneuver, for the revolutionary movement is really only a
movement when it is not at a standstill!
L.T.
POLITICAL PERSE CUTION
IN THE U S S R343
May 2 2 , 1936
Wide publicity has been given recently by the American press,

and the world press in general, to the preparations made for a
new constitution in the Soviet Union. The Soviet leaders have
stated that this constitution is going to be "the most democratic
of all constitutions in the world," and that from now on elections
are going to be carried out by universal, equal, direct, and secret
ballot. A few press interviewers, it is true, have asked whether in
view of the existence of only one party, the elections could truly
be regarded as free elections.
It is not my intention to deal with this particular argument
within the framework of this statement; but it is necessary to ask
another question: In what manner is the only party in existence
preparing the constitutional reform? The answer is: by unheard
of and uninterrupted acts of repression, not against the enemies
of the Soviet Union, but mainly against those elements who,
while remaining absolutely loyal to the [Soviet] system, find
themselves in opposition to the leadership, which it is impossible
to remove or even control. It is perfectly s afe to state that nine
tenths of the acts of political repression are serving not the
defense of the Soviet state, but the defense of the autocratic
government and privileges of the bureaucratic section within the
state. Thus, the only political party in existence becomes the
exclusive tool of the governing group.
Until recently, the "isolator", i.e. , the prison, has been
regarded-next to the death sentence-as the severest form of
punishment. The inhabitants of the political isolators, since 1 928,
are in the main former members of the governing party who,
without having in any way broken discipline, have taken a
critical stand in relation to the governing group or Stalin
personally. However, the latest developments show that the
isolators, owing to their limited capacity and the high cost of
324
Political Persecution in the USSR 325
their maintenance, are being rapidly replaced by concentration

camps, where prisoners are forced to live under inhuman physical
and moral conditions . The concentration camps are now spread
over the whole periphery of the country and are imitations of the
camps in Hitler Germany. Prisoners regard the transfer from an
isolator to a concentration camp as condemnation to slow death.
In consequence, during recent months in the Soviet Union
numerous hunger strikes have occurred among political prisoners
who thereby back their demands to stay in prison. The hunger
strike, generally recognized as a last act of desperation, has now
become the most common method used by political prisoners.
Taking as a basis for calculation the news published in the
official Soviet press, during the last nine months far more than
300,000, possibly up to half a million, members have been
expelled from the CP, and this form of "party purge" is being
constantly developed further. In the majority of cases, the
expelled are arrested, one section being sent to the concentration
camps, the other into exile. Stalin's organ, Pravda, of March 15,
publishes instructions to local authorities forbidding them to give
employment to political oppositionists. In a country where the
state is the only employer, this decree means starvation for the
victims. Hundreds of miserable remote hamlets in Siberia and
Central Asia are inhabited by tens of thousands of former
members of the Bolshevik Party who are leading the life of Hindu
pariahs. A single word of protest, the mere demand for work, will
send them to concentration camps, i.e. , into the worst forms of
hard labor. Moreover, those who succeed in surviving their
periods of imprisonment or exile receive a so-called "wolf's
passport," an identity paper which actually outlaws its bearer.
No one will house him; he is condemned to the life of a homeless
vagabond. The object of all these measures is to break the spirit
of these people, to force them into line with official views, or at
least to make them pretend by an open declaration that they
endorse the policy of the ruling power. By this method the
bureaucracy hopes to be able, after the introduction of the
"universal, secret ballot," to smother every spark of critical
thought in the country and thereby make sure that those types of
plebiscites can be put into operation which are sufficiently well
known to us in the history of present-day Germany.
If one wants to illustrate this general picture by individual
examples, the difficulty is to choose among a wealth of instances.
The following cases are reported recently from a bsolutely
trustworthy sources.
326 Writings of L eo n Trotsky (1935-36)
Last January, E. B. Solntsev died, at age 36, in Siberia. He was

one of the most brilliant of the young generation in the Soviet
Union, a highly educated economist. He had worked for about
two years with the Amtorg [Soviet Trade Organization] in
America, but when he returned in 1 928 he was arrested as a
"Trotskyist." After having served his sentence of three years
imprisonment in the Verkhne-Uralsk Isolator, he received a
further sentence of two years without any fresh charges. After
five years in the isolator, he was sent into exile in Siberia, his
wife and family being exiled to another place. This is the common
procedure for political prisoners, in spite of the official Soviet line
of "Defend the family. " Although it was impossible for Solntsev
to work politically in the Siberian wilderness, he was again
arrested in 1 935 and sentenced, without any justification, to a
further five years imprisonment. Solntsev declared a so-called
hunger strike to death, and thereby his intention to commit
suicide in this m anner. After starving for eighteen days, he was
told by the authorities he would be transferred not to prison, but
to another place of exile. But on the way, at one of the Siberian
relay stations, due to his weakened condition, he succumbed to a
chance infection and died.
Two other eminent representatives of the young generation,
Dingelstedt and Yakovin, are now going through the same
ordeal.344 They have already spent seven years in prison and it is
unlikely that they will ever be freed by the present authorities.
Lado Dumbadze, one of the oldest Bolsheviks; at the beginning
of the century the organizer of the underground printing shop in
the Caucasus; later, participant in the October Revolution and
highly esteemed by Lenin; a man of extremely modest and self
sacrificing character. From 1 928 onwards, he exchanged prison
with exile and exile with prison. The ordeals and privations
caused paralysis of his arms. The old man cannot dress alone,
nor write letters. Nevertheless, the vindictive bureaucracy has
sent him from the prison hospital into exile where sure death
awaits him.
Mrs. A.L. Bronstein, over 60 years old, with a record of forty
years of party work, has been torn from her grandchildren, whom
she was to look after, and taken from Leningrad to a Siberian
village where she can find neither work nor food.345
If space permitted, I could also describe the fate of the Eltsin
family, of the old father and his two sons, who have been sent
first to prison and then into exile, where recently one of the sons
has died; the tragic fate of Pankratov, a sailor, whose wife has
Political Pers ecution in the USSR 327
been sent to Siberia only because she refused to divorce her

husband, who lives in an isolator; the case of Mikhail Bodrov, a
heroic Moscow worker, who has now been transferred from an
isolator to a concentration camp; and dozens and hundreds of
others.
Let me only mention also the persecution against Lakhovitsky,
a tailor, whose relatives live in the USA. This worker, after
being deprived of every opportunity for work, was dragged from
place to place and has been driven to extreme misery. His wife, a
worker, has lost her factory job because of her refusal to divorce
her husband.
The exiles are deprived of the opportunity to correspond with
each other and with their relatives. Families who remain in
contact with their exiled relatives are in turn persecuted.
Remittances of money or parcels of commodities coming from
abroad are not handed over to the Oppositionists. The GPU
simply confiscates them without advising the sender or the
consignee. The exiled person is usually driven to a more remote
spot, so as to obliterate all trace of him to those abroad.
Even mutual aid of the exiles among each other is regarded as
a crime. A recent example: Mrs. M.M. Joffe, the widow of the late
famous Soviet diplomat, ambassador to Rome, Tokyo, etc., has
now been sent, after many years of exile, farther away to the
north of Siberia, because she endeavored to assist her suffering
friends. She has been accused of having initiated the oppositional
Red Cross. Her child has died in consequence of the severe
physical hardships of exile. Recalling that in 1928 A. Joffe
himself was driven by merciless persecution to commit suicide,
one has a complete picture of the family's tragic fate.346
A few weeks ago, Victor Serge arrived abroad with his
family.347 He is half-Russian, half-Belgian, a talented French
writer who since 1 928, as an Oppositionist in the Soviet Union,
was exposed to such incredible persecution and slander that it
completely unbalanced his wife's mind. The Moscow government
was compelled to deport him only because of the publicity given
by the European press to the terrible fate of this family and
because Victor Serge is very well known in the Belgian and
French literary world.
I have to add that in the Solovyetsky Isolator (possibly also in
others) a large number of foreign Oppositionist Communists are
kept in prison: Hungarians, Bulgarians, Rumanians, Poles, and
in general those nationalities whose governments are hardly
expected to raise a protest. Foreign Oppositionists are simply
condemned by the GPU as "spies_" By this method the Moscow

leadership of the Comintern is able to rid itself of all those
members who have become disgruntled and critical and thus
fallen into disfavor_
I need not emphasize that I am fully aware of the gravity of my
statements, and that I take unqualified political and moral
responsibility for them_ I suggest that an unbiased international
commission, composed of trustworthy persons who have the
confidence of the public, and in particular of the workers'
organizations, could find the means of investigating on the spot
all these facts, in order to clear up this matter once and for all. In
all countries there are societies of "Friends of the Soviet Union."
If they are in fact composed of true friends of the Soviet people,
and not of the ruling bureaucratic clique, it is their duty to raise
aloud with us the demand for such a commission, and thus put a
stop to these disgraceful persecutions and acts of vindictiveness.
THE SPICIEST DISHES
ARE STILL TO COME348
Published M ay 1936
In Comrade Ciliga's article "The Struggle for a Way Out"

(Biulleten Oppozitsii, no. 49), there is an account of the tortures to
which the GPU subjected a certain sailor in order to force from
him a confession that he took part in "a nonexistent conspiracy
against Stalin. " They left the sailor alone only when he "went
half-mad." This fact deserves the most serious attention.
The whole series of public political trials in the USSR has
shown how readily some of the accused inculpate themselves in
crimes which they clearly had not committed. Those accused who
seem, in court, to be playing a part learned by heart get off with
light, sometimes deliberately fake punishments. It is precisely in
exchange for this indulgence by the law that they made their
"confessions." But why are fictitious conspiracies necessary to
the authorities? Sometimes in order to implicate a third party,
known not to be involved in the matter; sometimes so as to cover
up their own crimes, such as bloody repressions unjustified by
anything; or finally, to create a climate favorable to the
Bonapartist dictatorship.
We have already shown, on the basis of official materials, that
a clear and direct part in the assassination of Kirov was played
by Medved, Yagoda, and Stalin. Not one of them, probably,
wanted the death of Kirov. But they all played with his life,
trying to create for the preparation of the terrorist act an
amalgam-with the "participation" of Zinoviev and Trotsky.
Zinoviev's testimony at the trial clearly had an evasive
character, which was the result of previous agreement between
accusers and accused: it was evidently only on this condition that
Zinoviev was promised his life.
Forcing fantastic testimony from the accused against them
selves so as to hit others on the rebound has long been the system
of the GPU, that is to say, the system of Stalin.
329
But why did an attempt on Stalin in 1 930 have to be set up?

And why did a sailor get drawn into the affair? We have no
evidence on this score but a few lines in Comrade Ciliga's article.
We will, nevertheless, take the risk of putting forward a
hypothesis.
In 1929, the author of these lines was exiled to Turkey. Soon
afterwards, he was visited in Constantinople by Blumkin, who
paid for the visit with his life.349 The shooting of Blumkin by
Stalin produced at the time a shattering impression on many
Communists, both in the USSR and in other countries. Abroad,
the Bolshevik-Leninist center was set up at that time and the
Biulleten and other publications started coming out. Under these
conditions Stalin had a pressing need for an "attempt,"
especially a kind of attempt whose threads would lead across the
frontier and in which Blumkin could be involved, or, more
exactly, his ghost could be. For this purpose a sailor would do
very well, especially if he went on trips between a Soviet port and
Constantinople. The sailor might have been arrested by chance
for incautious talk, for reading illegal literature, or simply for
smuggling: we know nothing about this sailor. They threatened
him, possibly with years in prison. But the inventive Yagoda
promised him his liberty and all sorts of other bonuses if he
would testify that Blumkin, on Trotsky's orders, involved him in
a conspiracy against Stalin. If the affair had succeeded, the exile
of Trotsky and the shooting of Blumkin would have been dealt
with at a single stroke. But then came the trouble: the sailor
"went half-mad."
Our hypothesis is only a hypothesis. But it completely fits the
moral nature of Stalin and the methods of his policy. "This cook,"
said Lenin in warning against Stalin, "will prepare only spicy
dishes." But even Lenin could not, of course, have foreseen in
February 1922, when these words were spoken, what a devil's
kitchen Stalin would build on the foundations of the Bolshevik
party.
It is now 1936. Stalin's methods remain the same. The political
dangers facing him have grown. The techniques of Stalin and
Yagoda have been improved by the experience of several
mistakes. We shall not fall into any illusions for that reason: the
spiciest dishes are still to come!
O N COMRADE CILIGA' S ARTICLES350
June 3 , 1 936
In publishing Comrade Ciliga's first article, we noted that the

author stood at that time outside the ranks of any party. In his
article in the Biulleten, no. 49, Comrade Ciliga briefly stated his
view of the USSR to be that of the "ultraleft" wing. At the same
time, Comrade Ciliga considers it possible to collaborate with the
Mensheviks. The history of the revolutionary movement is full of
examples of ultraleftists who approached opportunism . . . from
the other end of the spectrum. It goes without saying that our
Biulleten cannot have any political collaborators in common with
Menshevik publications. We are obliged therefore to cease
publication of Comrade Ciliga's articles.
We repeat once again: the political waverings of Comrade
Ciliga do not of course diminish in any way the significance of
the exceptionally important information that, thanks to him, has
become the property of the world working class.
331
THE NEW REVOLUTIONARY UPSURGE
AND THE TASKS
O F THE FOURTH INTERNATIONAL35 1
July 1936
1. The June strikes open a new period in the internal

development of France and Belgium. They will without doubt call
forth not only a further sharpening of the class struggle in these
countries, but also, in due course , mass movements over a
considerable part of Europe, including Great Britain, and
possibly even outside . Europe. Thus the Spanish revolution ceases
to be isolated.
2. The June strikes have shown how much indignation and
readiness for struggle have accumulated, under the deceptively
passive exterior, in the proletarian masses of the towns and
countryside during the years of crisis and reaction. They have
disclosed the sympathy of the broad masses of the urban petty
bourgeoisie and of the peasantry with the struggles of the
workers. Finally, they have shown the extreme instability of the
whole regime, the lack of self-confidence of the ruling classes,
their vacillations between Leon Blum and de la Rocque.352 These
three conditions-the readiness for struggle of the whole of the
proletariat, the acute dissatisfaction of the lower strata of the
petty bourgeoisie, the confusion in the camp of finance capital
provide the basic prerequisites for the proletarian revolution.
3. The militant offensive of the masses has assumed, this time
also, the character of a general strike. Partial, trade unionist
demands, important in themselves, were, for the workers, the
necessary means by which, after the long period of immobility,
the broadest possible masses could be aroused and united against
the bourgeoisie and its state. A general strike, opening a period of
revolutionary struggles, cannot but unite trade unionist and
partial demands with the general, though as yet unclearly
formulated, tasks of the whole class. In this union lies the
strength of the general strike, the guarantee of unity b etween the
vanguard and the broad masses of the class.
332
New Revolutionary Upsurge and Tasks of the FI 333
4. Our French section during recent years has placed the

general strike in the center of its propaganda. In distinction from
all other parties and groups speaking in the name of the working
class, the French Bolshevik-Leninists appraised the situation in
time as a prerevolutionary one, correctly understood the sympto
matic significance of the strike outbursts at Brest and Toulon,
and despite the ceaseless attacks of the opportunists and social
patriots (SFIO, CP, C GT)353 and the opposition of the centrists
(Marceau Pivert, etc. ) prepared by their agitation for a general
strike. On fertile soil a handful of seed gives a big yield. Thus,
under the conditions of social crisis and of the indignation of the
masses, a small organization, poor in material resources but
armed with correct slogans, has exercised an undoubted influence
upon the course of revolutionary events. The furious persecution
of the Bolshevik-Leninists by the whole capitalist, Social
Democratic, Stalinist, and trade unionist press, together with the
repression by the police and judges of Leon Blum, serves as an
external confirmation of this truth.
5. Not one of the official workers' organizations, either in
France or in Belgium, desired the struggle. The strikes arose
against the wishes of the trade unions and of both p arties. Only
when confronted with an accomplished fact did the official
leaders "recognize" the strike, in order all the more readily to
strangle it. But so far there has only been the question of a
comparatively "peaceful" movement, under slogans of partial
demands. Can it be doubted even for a moment that during the
period of open struggle for power the apparatuses of the Second
and Third Internationals will be, as was the case with the parties
of the Russian Social Revolutionaries and Mensheviks in 1917,
fully at the disposal of the bourgeoisie against the proletariat?
The necessity for a new International, as a world party of the
proletarian revolution, is once more irrefutably proved by the
events in France and Belgium.
6. Nevertheless the direct and immediate result of the great
June strike wave is the exceptionally rapid growth of the old
organizations. This fact is historically fully understandable.
Thus the Mensheviks and Social Revolutionaries grew feverishly
after the February revolution of 1 9 1 7 which they, as social
patriots, had not wanted during the war, and the German Social
Democracy expanded rapidly after the November revolution of
1 9 1 8 , which took place against its will. Before exposing their
bankruptcy before the whole class, the opportunist parties
become for a short time the refuge of the very broadest masses.
The rapid growth of the Socialist, and especially of the

"Communist" Party in France is a sure symptom of a revolution
ary crisis in the country and prepares at the same time the death
crises of the parties of the Second and Third Internationals.
No less significant is the unprecedentedly rapid growth of the
trade unions in France. While apparently increasing the weight
and importance of the united reformist-Stalinist trade union
general staff (Jouhaux, Racamond, etc.),354 the influx of millions
of new workers and employees in actual fact undermines the very
basis of the conservative trade union apparatus.
7. Great mass movements are the best tests of theories and
programs . The June strikes show how false are the ultraleft,
sectarian theories that the trade unions have "outlived" their
time and must be replaced by other organizations or that it is
necessary to build new, "genuine" trade unions alongside the old
conservative ones. In actual fact, during a revolutionary epoch
the struggle for economic demands and for social legislation does
not cease but, on the contrary, expands to an unheard-of extent.
The hundreds of thousands and millions of workers who have
swarmed into the trade unions destroy routine, shake loose the
conservative apparatus, allow the revolutionary party to build its
fractions in the unions, to gain influence, and successfully to
struggle for the leading role in the trade union movement. A
revolutionary party which is incapable of carrying on systematic
and successful work in the trade union organizations will be yet
more incapable of creating its own trade unions . All such
attempts are doomed to failure.
8. Contrary to the assertions of the leaders of the Second and
Third Internationals, present-day capitalism is already incapable
of either giving work to all workers or raising the standard of
living of the workers. Finance capital p asses the costs of social
reform onto the shoulders of the workers themselves and of the
petty bourgeoisie by means of rising prices, open or concealed
inflation, taxes, etc. The essence of the present "statism," of state
interference-in both "democratic" and fascist countries
consists in saving rotting capitalism at the price of lowering the
living and cultural standards of the people. No other method is
possible on the basis of private property. The programs of the
People's Fronts of France and Spain and that of the Belgian
coalition are a deliberate mirage and deception, the preparation
for a new disillusioning of the working masses.
9. The complete hopelessness of the position of the petty
bourgeoisie under the conditions of rotting capitalism means,
despite the shameful theories of "social harmony" of Leon Blum,

Vandervelde, Dimitrov, Cachin, and Company, that total reforms
in favor of the proletariat, unstable and deceitful in themselves,
accelerate the ruin of the small proprietors of the towns and
countryside and push them into the arms of fascism. A serious,
profound, and lasting union of the proletariat with the petty
bourgeois masses, as opposed to parliamentary combinations
with the Radical exploiters of the petty bourgeoisie, is possible
only on the basis of a revolutionary program, i.e., the seizure of
power by the proletariat and a revolution in property relations in
the interests of all the toilers . The "People's Front," as a coalition
with the bourgeoisie, is a brake on the revolution and a safety
valve for imperialism.
10. The first step to an alliance with the petty bourgeoisie is the
breaking up of the bloc with the bourgeois Radicals in France
and Spain, the bloc with the Catholics and Liberals in Belgium,
etc. It is necessary to explain this truth, on the basis of
experience, to every Socialist and Communist worker. Such is the
central task of the moment. The struggle against reformism and
Stalinism is at the present stage a struggle above all against a
bloc with the bourgeoisie. For the honest unity of the workers,
against dishonest unity with the exploiters! Bourgeoisie out of the
People's Front! Down with the capitalist ministers!
1 1 . At present it is only possible to guess at the tempo of the
coming revolutionary developments. Thanks to exceptional
conditions (the defeat in the war, the peasant problem, the
Bolshevik Party), the Russian revolution completed its ascent
from the overthrow of absolutism to the conquest of power by the
proletariat-in eight months. But even in this short period it
knew the armed April demonstration, the July defeat in
Petrograd, and the attempt of Kornilov to carry out a counterrev
olutionary coup in August.355 The Spanish revolution has already
lasted with ebbs and flows for five years. During this period the
workers and poor peasants of Spain have displayed such
magnificent political instincts, have developed so much energy,
devotion, and heroism, that state power would have been in their
hands long ago if the leadership had even to a small extent
corresponded to the political situation and to the militant
qualities of the proletariat. The true saviors of Spanish capital
ism were and remain not Zamora, not Azana, not Gil Robles,356
but the Socialist, Communist, and anarchist leaders of their
organizations.
12. The same now applies to France and Belgium. If the party
of Leon Blum was really Socialist it might, basing itself upon the
general strike, have overthrown the bourgeoisie in June, almost
without civil war, with a minimum of disturbance and of
sacrifices . But the party of Blum is a bourgeois party, the younger
brother of rotten Radicalism. If, in its turn, the "Communist"
Party had anything in common with Communism, it would from
the very first day of the strike have corrected its criminal
mistake, broken off its fatal bloc with the Radicals, called the
workers to the creation of factory committees and soviets , and
thus established in the country a regime of dual power as the
shortest and surest bridge to the dictatorship of the proletariat.
But in actual fact the apparatus of the Communist Party is
merely one of the tools of French imperialism. The key to the fate
of Spain, France, and Belgium is the problem of revolutionary
leadership.
13. The same conclusion follows from the lessons of interna
tional policy, from the so-called "struggle against war" in
particular. The social patriots and the centrists, especially the
French ones, justify their kowtowing to the League of Nations by
the passivity of the masses, especially by the unreadiness of the
masses to apply a boycott to Italy during her robber attack upon
Ethiopia. The same argument is used by pacifists of the Maxton
type in order to hide their prostration. In the light of the June
events it becomes especially clear that the masses did not react to
the international provocations of the imperialists simply because
they were deceived, lulled to sleep, held back, paralyzed, and
demoralized by the leaderships of their own organizations. If the
Soviet trade unions had given a timely example by boycotting
Italy, the movement would, like a prairie fire, have inevitably
embraced all of Europe and the whole world, and at once become
menacing to the imperialists of all countries. But the Soviet
bureaucracy forbade and stifled all revolutionary initiative,
replacing it by the prostration of the Comintern before Herriot,
Leon Blum, and the League of Nations. The problem of the
international policy of the proletariat, like that of the internal
policy, is a problem of re volutionary leadership.
14. Every real mass movement freshens the atmosphere like a
storm, and at the same tim e destroys every kind of political
fiction and ambiguity. In the light of the June events the slogan
of "uniting" the two Internationals , which are already sufficient
ly united in betraying the interests of the proletariat, and the
homeopathic recipes of the London Bureau (the Two-and-a-Half
International), which vacillates between all possible courses of
policy and always picks out the worst, appear pitiable and
contemptible.
The June events have exposed at the same time the complete
bankruptcy of anarchism and of so-called "revolutionary syndi
calism."357 Neither one nor the other, so far as they actually exist
upon this earth, foresaw the events or helped to prepare for them.
The propaganda for a general strike, for factory committees, for
workers' control, has been exclusively carried on by a political
organization, i.e., a party. It could not be otherwise. The mass
organizations of the working class remain powerless, undecided,
and lost, if they are not inspired and led forward by a firmly
welded-together vanguard. The necessity for a revolutionary
party is shown with new force.
1 5 . Thus, all the tasks of the revolutionary struggle unfailingly
lead to one task-the creation of a new, really revolutionary,
leadership, capable of dealing with the tasks and possibilities of
our epoch . Direct participation in the movement of the masses,
bold class slogans taken to their conclusion, an independent
banner, irreconcilability toward compromisers, mercilessness
towards traitors-here lies the road of the Fourth International.
It is both amusing and absurd to discuss whether it is yet time to
"found" it. An International is not "founded" like a cooperative,
but created in struggle. The June days provide an answer to the
pedants who discuss its "timeliness." There is no room for further
discussion.
1 6 . The bourgeoisie seeks its revenge. A new social conflict,
which is being deliberately prepared in the general staffs of big
capital, will undoubtedly assume from the very first the character
of a large-scale provocation or series of provocations directed at
the workers. At the same time the "dissolved" fascist organiza
tions are making feverish preparations. The collision of the two
camps in France, Belgium, and Spain is absolutely inevitable.
The more the leaders of the People's Front "reconcile" the class
antagonisms and dampen the revolutionary struggle, the more
explosive and convulsive a character it will assume in the im
mediate future, the more sacrifices it will cause, the more
defenseless the proletariat will find itself against fascism.
1 7 . The sections of the Fourth International clearly and
distinctly see this danger. They openly warn the proletariat of it.
They teach the vanguard to organize itself and to prepare. At the
same time they contemptuously reject the policy of washing their
hands of responsibility; they identify their fate with the fate of
the struggling masses, however severe may be the blows which
fall on them in the coming months and years. They participate in

every act of struggle in order to bring to it the utmost possible
clarity and organization. They tirelessly call for the creation of
factory committees and soviets. They unite with the best workers
brought to the top by the movement and hand-in-hand with them
build the new revolutionary leadership.
By their example and criticism, they speed the formation of a
revolutionary wing in the old parties, drawing it closer in the
course of the struggle and impelling it along the road of the
Fourth International.
Participation in the living struggle, always in the front line of
fire, work in the trade unions, and the building up of the party
all go on at the s ame time, mutually supplementing each other.
All the fighting slogans-workers' control, workers' militia, the
arming of the workers, a government of workers and peasants,
the socialization of the means of production-are indissolubly
bound up with the creation of workers', peasants', and soldiers'
soviets.
18. The fact that at the moment of mass struggle the French
Bolshevik-Leninists found themselves at once at the center of
political attention and hatred of the class enemies is no accident;
on the contrary, it unmistakably indicates the future. Bolshe
vism, which appears to be sectarianism to philistines of all
descriptions, in actual fact unites ideological irreconcilability
with the greatest sensitivity with regard to movements of the
masses. Ideological irreconcilability itself is nothing else than the
purging of the consciousness of the advanced workers of routine,
inertia, irresoluteness, i.e., the education of the vanguard in the
spirit of the boldest decisions, preparing it to participate in the
relentless mass struggle.
1 9 . Not a single revolutionary grouping in world history has
yet experienced such terrible pressure as the grouping of the
Fourth International. The Communist Manifesto of Marx and
Engels spoke of the forces of the "pope and the czar . . . French
Radicals and German police" united against communism. From
this list only the czar is now missing. But the Stalinist
bureaucracy is a far more threatening and treacherous obstacle
on the road of the world revolution than the autocratic czar once
was. The Comintern covers a policy of social patriotism and
Menshevism with the authority of the October Revolution and the
b anner of Lenin. The world agency of the GPU is already, hand
in-hand with the police of "friendly" imperialist countries, car
rying on systematic work against the Fourth International. In
the event of the outbreak of war, the united forces of imperi alism
and Stalinism will inflict upon the revolutionary international
ists immeasurably more furious persecutions than those which
the generals of the Hohenzollerns together with the S ocial
Democratic butchers inflicted in their time upon Luxemburg,
Liebknecht, and their supporters .
20. The sections of the Fourth International are not frightened
either by the immensity of the tasks , the furious hatred of their
enemies, or even their own smallness in numbers. Even now the
struggling masses, without yet being conscious of it, stand much
nearer to us than to their official leaders. Under the blows of
coming events in the workers' m ovement there will take place an
ever more rapid and far-reaching regroupment. In France the
Socialist P arty will be squeezed out of the ranks of the proletariat.
In the Communist Party a s eries of splits may surely be expected.
In the unions there will be created a powerful left movement
susceptible to the slogans of Bolshevism . In another form
identical processes will take place in other countries also drawn
into the revolutionary crisis . The organizations of the revolution
ary vanguard will cease to be isolated. The slogans of Bolshevism
will become the slogans of the masses. The coming epoch will be
the epoch of the Fourth International.
POSTSCRIPT
"The collision of the two camps in France, Belgium, and Spain

is absolutely inevitable. The m ore the leaders of the People's
Front 'reconcile' the class antagonisms and dampen the revolu
tionary struggle, the more explosive and convulsive a character it
will assume in the immediate future, the more sacrifices it will
cause, and the more defenseless the proletariat will fin d itself
against fascism" (see above, p aragraph 16). The events h ave
brought a confirmation of this prediction even before the present
theses could be published.
The July days [in Spain] deepen and supplement the lessons of
the June days in France with exceptional force. For the second
time in five years the coalition of the l abor parties with the
Radical bourgeoisie has brought the revolution to the edge of the
abyss. Incapable of solving a single one of the tasks posed by the
revolution-since all these tasks boil down to one, namely, the
crushing of the bourgeoisie-the People's Front renders the
existence of the bourgeois regime impossible and thereby
provokes the fascist coup d'etat. By lulling the workers and
peasants with parliamentary illusions, by p aralyzing their will

to struggle, the People's Front creates favorable conditions for the
victory of fascism . The policy of coalition with the bourgeoisie
must be paid for by the proletariat with years of new torments
and sacrifice, if not by decades of fascist terror.
The People's Front government reveals its total inadequacy
precisely at the most critical moment, one ministerial crisis
follows the other because the bourgeois Radicals fear the armed
workers more than they do the fascists . The civil war takes on a
lingering character. Whatever the immediate outcome of the civil
war in Spain m ay be, it strikes a death blow at the People's Front
in France and other countries. It must henceforth become clear to
every French worker that the bloc with the Radicals signifies the
legal preparation of a military coup d'etat by the French general
staff under cover of the minister of war D al adier.
The administrative dissolution of the fascist leagues whil e the
bourgeois state app aratus is m aintained, is, as the Spanish
example shows, a lie and a deception. Only the armed workers
can resist fascism. The conquest of power by the proletari at is
possible only on the road of armed insurrection against the state
apparatus of the bourgeoisie. The smashing of this apparatus
and its replacement by worker, soldier, and peasant councils is
the necessary condition for the fulfillment of the socialist
program. Without the carrying out of these tasks, the proletariat
and the petty bourgeoisie have no way out of misery and need,
and no way of being saved from the new war.
TO THE PUBLIC O PINION OF THE
WORKERS OF THE WHOLE WORLD358
July 4, 19 36
The question of the fate of the Soviet Union is near to the heart
of every thinking worker. A hundred and seventy million human
beings are carrying out the greatest experiment in social
emanicipation in history. The destruction of the new regime
would signify a terrible blow to the development of the whole of
mankind. But precisely for this reason there arises the necessity
for an honest, i.e., critical attitude toward all those complex
processes and contradictory phenomena which are to be observed
in the life of the Soviet Union.
The most alarming symptom of the internal life of the USSR is
without doubt the continued and severe repressions, which are
carried out in most cases not against the supporters of capitalist
restoration but against revolutionaries who have come into some
sort of conflict with the ruling stratum. In recent months the
world press has carried numerous communications concerning
exceptionally severe repressions against the oppositional mem
bers of the ruling party itself and also against foreign C om
munists, who cannot count upon the protection of the embassy of
their own country. Prisons have already proved inadequate.
Concentration camps have been developed to a greater degree
than was ever the case during the civil war. Ever increasing
collective and individual hunger strikes and suicides have been
the answer of the prisoners to the unendurable persecutions. The
numerous tragic facts have been confirmed by persons meriting
full confidence and ready to appear before any tribunal with
confirmation of their evidence. A critical mind refuses to reconcile
these facts with the official affirmation that a socialist society
has been "finally and irrevocably" set up in the USSR.
On June 5 Pravda, the leading paper of the USSR, announced
the acceptance by the Central Committee of the ruling party of
341
the draft of a new constitution, "the most democratic in the

world." The leading article, in commenting on this most
important decision, announced at the same time new and yet
more terrible repressions against the oppositionists. The question
is so important that we consider it necessary to repeat word for
word the statement made by Pravda, as the direct mouthpiece of
the ruling circles. Having pointed out "the tremendous victories
of socialism" which find their expression in the new constitution,
the paper at the same time demands "increased vigilance"
against "the class forces hostile to socialism . "
I t would, however, b e a mistake t o think that i t i s here a
question of advocates of the restoration of the monarchy, the
nobility, or the bourgeoisie. On the contrary, by means of a series
of decrees and subsequently in the corresponding paragraph of
the new constitution, the inequality of citizens by reason of their
social origin has been finally removed. According to the official
explanations, socialist society has become so strong that it need
no longer fear those of noble or bourgeois origin. So far as "as the
class hostilities to socialism," against which sterner measures are
demanded, are concerned, Pravda says the following: "The
struggle continues. Too weak for a direct attack, the remains of
the counterrevolutionary groups, the White Guardists of all
colors, especially the Trotskyists and Zinovievists, have not given
up their base, spying, sabotage, and terrorist work. With a firm
hand we will continue in the future to strike down and destroy the
enemies of the p eople, the Trotskyist vermin and furies, however
skillfully they may disguise themselves. "
These words speak for themselves. While publishing "the most
democratic constitution in the world" the ruling group of the
Soviet Union promises at the same time to "destroy" the
supporters of a definite section of socialist thought, accusing
them of such crimes as "spying," "sabotage" (?), and "terrorist
work." The accusation obviously has a hallucinatory character. It
is not one j ot better than the accusations against the medieval
heretics of causing droughts and epidemics or the accusations
against the Jews of using Christian blood. But this does not
detract from the terrible reality of the threat of destruction.
The so-called "Trotskyist" movement has an international
character and publishes books and papers in no less than fifteen
languages. One can regard this movement in various ways: one
can sympathize with it, or, on the contrary, condemn it; but every
thinking worker, every serious-minded person, is able to convince
himself from irrefutable documents that it is a question of a
To the Public Opinion of the World's Workers 343
revolutionary grouping setting itself the task of emancipating the

toilers. Thus, during the June events in Paris the bourgeois press
unanimously attacked the "Trotskyists" for stirring up strikes
and the press of the Comintern accused them of trying to evoke a
revolution artificially. Can it be believed for a moment that one
and the same movement, guided by the same people and ideas,
strives in all capitalist countries to overthrow the power of the
bourgeoisie, but attempts in the USSR to restore capitalism with
the assistance of "spying," "sabotage," and "terrorist" work?
Every disinterested friend of the USSR, i.e., every friend of the
toiling masses, must say to himself: The official explanations
contain a plain, an obvious falsehood. While openly preparing the
physical destruction of its ideological opponents, the ruling group
cannot find a single serious word to say in explanation or
justification of such repressions. Can such a position be borne
passively and silently?
We declare before the public opinion of the whole world that it
is not true that the "Trotskyists" and "Zinovievists" are striving
or can strive toward the restoration of capitalism; it is not true
that they have or can have any connection with the spying
intrigues or terrorist attempts of the counterrevolution; it is not
true that their activity is directed or can be directed against
socialism. But on the other hand, it is an incontrovertible truth,
as is evident from the whole literature on the question, that the
"Trotskyists" are the opponents of the policy of the ruling Soviet
group, the opponents of the ever-increasing social inequality in
the USSR, the opponents of the restoration of the officer-caste,
and, above all, the opponents of the unlimited power and
unlimited privileges of the bureaucracy. It is not the Soviet
proletariat which is punishing its " class enemies," but the Soviet
bureaucracy which, in the struggle for the maintenance of its
power and privileges, is destroying a group which is trying to
express the protest and discontent of the toiling masses.
We take upon ourselves full responsibility for our words, which
can be verified at any moment without difficulty; it is only
necessary for the Soviet government to give an impartial
international commission the opportunity to freely acquaint itself
on the spot with the real or alleged crimes of the Trotskyists,
Zinovievists, and other oppositional groups. We desire nothing
better.
Every working class organization, every progressive social
group, every honest newspaper, every friend of the toilers, is
interested in the full and conclusive clarification of this burning
question. It is necessary to draw back the curtain from an

unending series of tragedies . It is necessary to obtain an
investigation. It is necessary to discover the whole truth. In
working class organizations, at meetings, in the press, it is
necessary to raise and support the demand for sending to the
USSR an impartial commission, authoritative to everyone, with
the object of investigating the real reasons for the repressions
with which the bureaucracy threatens the revolutionaries, both
Trotskyists and Zinovievists , and also the representatives of
other movements . If the Soviet bureaucracy has nothing to hide
in this matter from the world working class, it must m eet such a
demand.
HOW THE WORKERS IN AUSTRIA
SHOULD FIGHT HITLER359
Published July 1936
A: Don't you think the Revolutionary Socialists360 and the CP

are right when they say that the Austrian workers have the same
obligation as the French workers? Don't they have to defend their
country in order not to be attacked by Hitler?
B: If the French workers defended "their" country (is it really

then their country?) under the leadership of Blum and Cachin,
they would do Hitler the greatest service they are capable of.
They would make it possible for him to tell the German workers:
"They always talk to you about class struggle. The class struggle
is a fraud. The French worker defends his country. Ties of blood
are stronger than Marxist dogma . The German worker must also
defend his fatherland. We are engaged in a holy, national
struggle. "
That i s h o w Hitler would speak. And h e would not find i t
difficult t o win belief, i n view of t h e fact that a significant p art o f
t h e German working class i s contaminated with n ationalism, a
contamination encouraged by the earlier policies of the German
SP and CPo No, there is only one way to cure the German
working class of its nationalist infection: the class struggle
against one's own bourgeoisie in every country!
A: And are we then to take no notice of the political regime of a

country? France is a democracy, Germany a fascist dictatorship .
Isn't a war between France and Germany a struggle of two
irreconcilable political regimes?
B: No. It is a struggle of two imperialisms. In the world war,

to o , the social patriots of the Entente countries, like Longuet and
Henderson, spoke of the struggle of democracy against Habsburg
and Hohenzollern militarism and of the struggle for a "just"
peace . 3 6 1 We are familiar with the "just" Versailles peace.
345
On the other side, the German social patriots like Wels and
Scheidemann chattered about the fight " against czarism." But
this did not hinder these gentlemen from supporting their
government after czarism had been overthrown and when the
German army was led against the Russian revolution.
They did not even vote against the vile peace dictated at Brest
Litovsk. All these formulas-"struggle of the democracies,"
"friend of peace," "antifascist alliance," etc.-are nothing but
ideological cloaks. If fascist Italy decides to fight on the side of
France, these people will begin to distinguish between a
"constructive" and a "destructive" fascism.
A: But one cannot overlook the fact that France is an ally of

Soviet Russia. If French imperialism is weakened, Soviet Russia
will also be weakened.
B: Does imperialist France really appear to you to be a certain,

reliable partner of the Soviet Union?
Let's consider the question from the standpoint of the best
possible case: the day on which National Socialist Germany is
conquered. On that day at the latest, imperialist France will ally
itself with death and the devil and, if need be, with recently
defeated bourgeois Germany, against the Soviet Union. The only
certain aid for the Soviet Union is the victory of the revolution in
the capitalist countries, no matter what their political regime and
foreign policy may be.
The development of revolutionary struggle will weaken impe
rialism? Of course. That is precisely the point! That is the way
the Soviet Union will be strengthened.
A: Perhaps you didn't completely understand me. I see the

following danger: If French imperialism is weakened by the
sharpening of revolutionary struggle, and the French army is
undermined, then Hitler would be strengthened and could win a
military victory over a France embroiled in civil war. He might
even capture all of France.
B: If revolutionary battles and victories had no effect outside

the country in which they occur, events might turn out as you
have pictured them. But reality is quite different.
In war, the morale of the soldiers is crucial. To undermine the
bourgeois morale of an army, there is no stronger means than the
example of revolutionary struggle. Revolutionary example is
How the Workers in A ustria Should Fight Hitler 347
effective in any situation, but to an especially high degree in

wartime. For the hungry masses, who have death staring them in
the face, engaging in a revolution during a war is far less of a
risk than not engaging in it.
There is also a whole series of new circumstances that hasten
the unleashing of the revolutionary process and that drastically
shorten, in particular, the duration of the revolutionary struggle
for power. Consider only the changed picture of modern war, the
direct horrors of which (air war!) will this time be visited on the
rear areas too.
And let's not forget that the masses have learned a great deal
from the experiences of the last war and the postwar period.
Above all, don't overlook the proletarian revolution throughout
the world, which represents a far more important factor than in
the previous world war, not only in numbers but also in richness
of experience and political maturity. All this makes it probable
that the revolutionary process will be incomparably quicker than
it was in Russia in 1 9 1 7.
Nevertheless, we cannot say it is excluded that the ever-so-short
period before the victory of the proletarian uprising will permit
Hitler to occupy a portion of France. It is conceivable that at first
Hitler's powers of endurance will be stronger than the effects of
revolutionary battle. But with the victory of the revolution, the
opportunity will be quickly regained to reconquer the lost regions
and, beyond that, to squeeze German capitalism to death in the
vise of a workers' France and the Soviet Union.
A. I have to admit there is much to that. But does the same

thing apply for little Austria that applies for big France? Isn't
there the danger that Hitler will swallow all of Austria?
B: Politics, especially revolutionary politics, is inconceivable

without danger. "A real socialist," Lenin writes in his August 20,
1918, letter to the American workers, "would not fail to
understand that for the sake of achieving victory over the
bourgeoisie, for the sake of power passing to the workers, for the
sake of starting the world proletarian revolution, we cannot and
must not hesitate to make the heaviest sacrifices, including the
sacrifice of part of our territory, the sacrifice of heavy defeats at
the hands of imperialism . A real socialist would have proved by
deeds his willingness for 'his' country to make the greatest
sacrifice to give a real push forward to the cause of the socialist
revolution.
"For the sake of 'their' cause, that is, for the s ake of winning
world hegemony, the imperialists of Britain and Germany have
not hesitated to utterly ruin and throttle a whole number of
countries, from Belgium and Serbia to Palestine and Mesopota
mia. But must socialists wait with 'their' cause, the cause of
liberating the working people of the whole world from the yoke of
capital, of winning universal and lasting peace, until a path
without sacrifice is found? Must they fear to open the battle until
an easy victory is 'guaranteed'? Must they place the integrity and
security of 'their' bourgeois-created 'fatherland' above the
interests of the world socialist revolution? The scoundrels . . .
who think this way, those lackeys who grovel to bourgeois
morality, thrice stand condemned" [Lenin, Collected Works
(Moscow, 1965), vol. 28].
If there is a way to defend oneself against Hitler in Austria, it
is by striking at one's own bourgeoisie. The politics of the "lesser
evil" leads only to the greatest evil. To get Hitler, there was no
more certain way than supporting Bruening.362 The same holds
true for the Austrian Bruenings.
A: And your solution is?
B: The revolutionary two-front war. The task is to combine the

struggle against Schuschnigg with the struggle against the
Nazis.363 One cannot participate in the independence swindle.
But that is a problem we must discuss another time.
A: You just s aid that the Austrian proletariat must combine

the struggle against Schuschnigg with the struggle against
Hitler. You shouldn't overlook the fact that the Revolutionary
Socialists and the CP also want to overthrow Schuschnigg.
B: Of course they want to. But at the same time they take the
position of defending Austrian "independence," that is, the same
position as Schuschnigg. By doing so they confuse the workers;
they disorganize and hamstring the proletarian struggle. Their
speech is less and less distinguishable from that of the
government. "Austria" is the b attle cry of the government.
"Austria" is also the slogan of the CPo One can read in its Rote
Fahne (the issue for the end of June 1936):
"Yes, we declare ourselves for Austria! Not only do we declare
ourselves: the workers are the only ones who fight for Austria. We
will save Austria from betrayal and catastrophe by fighting
How the Workers in A ustria Should Fight Hitler 349
against the handful of adventurers and politicians of catastrophe

in the authoritarian government, the Heimwehr [Home Guard]
bands, the Nazis, and the supporters of the Hapsburgs. "
A rbeiter-Zeitung, the organ o f the Revolutionary Socialists,
uses the same kind of language.
A: But don't the Revolutionary Socialists and the CP want to

defend Austrian independence only after the bourgeoisie has
restored democracy?
B: Certainly. "The workers will defend only a free Austria " is

the way their continual declamations go. The bureaucrats would
like to be paid for handing over to the bourgeoisie workers trained
to be enthusiastic cannon fodder.
A: But don't they want to defend the independence of Austria

in order to fend off Hitler?
B: First of all, the so-called independence of Austria is a lie. In

reality Austria is a vassal of Italian imperialism. When the
Revolutionary Socialists and the CP scream at the top of their
lungs about the "independence" of Austria, that only indicates
their effort to protect Austria from Anschluss [union with
Germany] and to m ake it into a vassal of the no-Iess-imperialist
bloc of France and the Little Entente,364 which is allied with the
Soviet Union.
Their entire policy proceeds from the idea: The main enemy of
both the Austrian and the Russian workers is Hitler. Therefore
the first task is to strike at Hitler. For this reason it is necessary
to ally the proletariat with all the "antifascist forces," under
which shamefaced name the "democratic" bourgeoisie inside and
outside of Austria are included. This alliance, naturally, is
possible only with the complete deferment of the class struggle.
On any other basis an alliance between the proletariat and the
bourgeoisie is inconceivable. But as we have just attempted to
show, this policy facilitates the victory of the Nazis.
Our path is quite different. We proceed from the opinion that
war puts the question of fighting for power before the workers
perhaps even more sharply than the economic crisis.
One must use the war to unchain the proletarian revolution in
all countries. But that is possible only through the sharpest
opposition and struggle against the power conducting the war.
Only in this way can we gather the lower layers of the petty
bourgeoisie and decisive parts of the army around the proletariat

and carry out the revolution.
On Sundays and holidays the Revolutionary Socialists and the
CP also speak about the revolution, but they don't really believe
in it. If they did, they would not direct the hopes of the masses
they influence toward parts of their own bourgeoisie and the
bourgeoisie of other countries. They would not talk of the "peace
front" -that is, the front of the bourgeoisie in those countries that
are opposed to Hitler, but are just as imperialistic as Hitler-and
ignore the only real peace front, that of the international working
class .
If the present situation i s not to e n d i n another war, i n which
one imperialist grouping emerges victorious, instead of the
proletarian revolution in as many countries as possible, then the
hopes of the workers must be directed not toward the class
enemy, whatever the guise it takes, but toward their own
strength, toward revolutionary action against their own bourgeoi
SIe.
The proletariat can be the strongest social force in modern
society. What hinders the victorious unfolding of this power is the
parties that still have great influence over the proletariat. The
proletariat has been weakened and is kept in this weakened
condition by its old and degenerated parties, whose entire work
consists of inoculating their followers with disbelief in the
proletariat's class strength.
One cannot make the revolution with leaders who do not
believe in the revolution. From this comes the unavoidable
conclusion: If the socialist revolution is to triumph, it is necessary
to devote all our strength in every country to the building of a
new revolutionary workers' organization. This is an obligation
for everyone who does not want to see the working class again
neglect a great historic opportunity.
FOR CALM AND OBJECTIVE WORK36 5
July 6, 1936
Dear Comrade Glotzer:

I must say quite frankly that your letter brings me no new facts
about the Socialist Party. I have had absolutely no illusions
about this organization, especially insofar as the leadership is
concerned. Whether the number of members is 16 or 20 or even
25,000 is not very important. What is far more important is that a
number of our comrades, as for example Comrade Gould, have a
distorted position.366 Far too much attention is paid to Roan and
the like and, I fear, far too little to the positive tasks of our work,
especially in the youth.
Also the question long-term-short-term seems artificial to me
at this point. Comrade Muste showed me his document on this
where it says more or less: in the next five months the party will
be absorbed with the elections. During this period, it is a question
of calmly going about gaining a foothold in this party, i.e.,
carrying out calm preparatory and especially propaganda work.
A further practical line can only flow out of the experience of the
next months. In my opinion, therefore, the memories of previous
arguments and ruminations over every possible variant for
development should be put aside and you should go to work in a
calm and objective fashion. A regrouping in your own ranks is
unavoidable. Many people who did not want to enter the SP will
adhere to this party enthusiastically if the local is successful.
And on the other hand, supporters of entry who are disillusioned
in practical work will surely become intransigent, and so on.
As for Comrade Gould, for whom I have heard strong praise
from many sides, I regret that he has taken such a biased and
incorrect attitude concerning Comrade Cannon. Cannon has
never "lied" to me. Moreover, his letters to me have been
published. I have carefully studied all of the documents. I have
had no illusions from the beginning. It is better, moreover, to win
351
With Natalia Sedova
(second from right)
and their hosts, the
Knudsens.
With A.J. Muste, early July 1 936.

For Calm and Objective Work 353
over a thousand young Socialists than to lose three or four

hundred old members through permanent internal strife.
We have had very extensive discussions with Comrade Muste
with great benefit-I trust-for mutual understanding. We said
good-bye to him and his wife as the best of friends yesterday. We
are now waiting for Shachtman.
With best greetings,
Yours,
L. Trotsky
THE FOURTH INTERNATIONAL
AND THE SOVIET UNION367
July 8, 1936
1. The decision of the Seventh World Congress of the Comin

tern, according to which socialism in the Soviet Union has
"finally and irrevocably" triumphed-regardless of the low level
of labor productivity as compared with the advanced capitalist
countries and independently of the course of development of all
the rest of the world!-is a crude and dangerous lie. The reference
to the fact that the Soviet Union covers "one-sixth of the earth's
surface" is all the less decisive in this question by virtue of the
fact that only 8.5 percent of humanity has settled upon this area.
It continues to be a question of the struggle between two
irreconcilable systems-socialism and capitalism. This struggle
has not been decided and cannot be decided within the
boundaries of the USSR. It will be possible to decide the question
"finally and irrevocably" only on the world arena.
2. The principal mass of the means of production in the
industry of the Soviet Union has grown tremendously and
remains in the hands of the state-in agriculture, in the hands of
the kolkhozes, which stand between state and private property.
But not even state property is as yet socialist property, for the
latter has as its premise the dying away of the state as the
guardian of property, the mitigation of inequality and the
gradual dissolution of the property concept even in the morals
and customs of society. The real development in the Soviet Union
in recent years has followed a directly opposite road. Inequality
grows and, together with it, state coercion. Given favorable
domestic and international conditions, the transition is possible
from the present state property to socialism; given unfavorable
conditions, however, a reversion to capitalism is also possible.
3. Every workers' state, in the first period, will, in the interests
of raising the productive forces, retain the system of work-wages,
or as Marx puts it, "the bourgeois norms of distribution." The
354
The Fourth International and the Soviet Union 355
question is, however, decided by the general direction of the

development. Were the advanced countries to be drawn into the
revolution, and were social wealth to grow rapidly, then
inequality would have to diminish speedily and the state would
soon have nothing more to "guard." Given the isolation and the
backwardness of the Soviet land, the bourgeois norms of
distribution took on a crude and meretricious character (enor
mous differentiation of work-wages, bonuses, titles, orders, and
more of the same), and engendered retrograde tendencies that
imperil the very system of state property.
4. Low productivity, with high capital investments, with
tremendous military expenditures and the enormous wastefulness
of the uncontrolled apparatus, signifies the continuous salient
lack of the most important objects of personal consumption for
the masses of the population. The economic successes, which are
much too modest for a significant material and cultural elevation
of the whole people, are already proving adequate for the
emergence of a broad, privileged stratum. The social antagonisms
have not been mitigated in the course of the second five year
plan, but are enormously accentuated. Inequality is growing by
leaps and bounds. The hymns of praise to the "happy life" are
sung only by the summits, while the lower strata continue in
enforced silence.
5. Playing upon the manifold social antagonisms (town and
country, mental and physical labor, individual farms, kolkhozes,
and tiny private farms of the kolkhoz members, Stakhanovites
and the rest of the working masses), the Soviet bureaucracy has
acquired an actual independence from the toilers. Like every
bureaucracy, it regulates the antagonisms in the interests of the
stronger, of the better off, of the privileged. Like every bureaucra
cy, it takes, toward the end, a significant portion of the national
income for itself and thereby becomes the most privileged of all
the privileged strata.
6. By its conditions of personal existence, Soviet society even
now presents an enormous hierarchy: from vagabond children,
prostitutes, slum proletarians-to the ruling "ten thousand" who
lead the life of Western European magnates of capital. In
contradiction to the contentions of the Seventh Congress of the
Comintern, socialism has not yet triumphed; neither in the
objective economic conditions of the USSR (the criterion of the
productivity of labor) nor in the consciousness of the producing
masses (the criterion of personal consumption).
7. It remains a fact of decisive significance, however, that all
the social relationships of the USSR, the privileges of the Soviet

aristocracy included, base themselves in the long run on state
and kolkhoz property, acquired by the expropriation of the
bourgeoisie which, in distinction from capitalist property, opens
up the possibility of the growth of industry and of culture. The
historical gulf dug by the O ctober Revolution continues to
separate the So viet s tate planned economy from capitalist "state
ism," which signifies state intervention for the purpose of saving
private property and which "regulates" the obsolete economic
system by putting the brakes on the development of the
productive forces and by lowering the standard of living of the
peop le. The identification of the Soviet economy with the fascist
(Italy, Germany), which occurs so frequently among liberal
economists, is a fruit of ignorance or of unscrupulousness. The
victory of the Bonapartist bureaucracy of the USSR over the
proletarian vanguard is by no means equivalent to the victory of
the capitalist counterrevolution, although the former blazes the
trail for the latter.
8. To assert (like the anarchists and all sorts of ultraleftists),
that the Soviet Union deserves, on the part of the revolutionary
proletariat, the same attitude as do the imperialist states, is to
assert that it is a matter of indifference to the working class
whether state industry and collectivized agriculture in the Soviet
Union are to be preserved and further developed, or whether the
economy is to be flung back into conditions of decomposition and,
by means of a civil war, to fascist capitalism. Such an attitude is
worthy of the disappointed idealistic "friends" of the Soviet
Union, that is, of the dilettantes and political windbags of the
liberal and anarchist type, but by no means of Marxian
revolutionists, who never leave out of consideration the basic
facto r of history: the development of production.
9. As has been said, the social stratification of Soviet society is
developing mainly in the field of distribution and only partially,
above all in agriculture, in the field of production. But distribu
tion is not separated by an impenetrable wall from production.
By deliberately stimulating the appetites of individuals and
groups to the point where they become unbridled, the bureaucracy
directly discredits the idea of social property. The growth of
economic privileges engenders among the masses a justified
doubt as to whom, in the long run, the whole system will actually
serve. The "bourgeois norms of distribution," which have already
far exceeded the permissible limit, finally threaten to blow up the
social discipline of the planned economy and therewith also state
and kolkhoz property.
10. The possible roads to the restoration of the bourgeois

system are revealed with particular clarity in the question of the
family. Since the bureaucracy, as a consequence both of the low
material and cultural level of the country and of the throttling of
the initiative of the masses, has not succeeded in fulfilling the
tasks of social maintenance and upbringing, it has begun to
reestablish and glorify the petty-bourgeois family, including its
narrow private economy-that fostering soil of all species of
social idiocy. But the family raises with particular sharpness the
question of the right of inheritance. The bureaucracy itself, which
endeavors to base itself politically upon the conservative family,
feels its own domination to be defective and incomplete, for it is
not in a position to bequeath its material privileges to its
successors. The question of the right of inheritance leads,
however, to the question of the further extension of the bounds of
private property. This is one of the possible channels of the
restoration of capitalism. In all fields of social life, the
bureaucracy imperils everything that is progressive in the Soviet
system. Instead of the guardian of "socialist property," it
becomes its gravedigger.
11. The political significance of the new constitution of the
USSR is in direct contradiction to its official interpretation. The
"Stalinist constitution" is no step forward, "from socialism to the
communist society," as the official authorities brazenly assert,
but it is on the contrary a step backward, from the dictatorship of
the proletariat toward a bourgeois political regime.
The development of socialist society should find its expression
in the political field in the dying away of the state. The degree of
this dying away is the surest measure of the successes of socialist
development. The beginning of the dying away of the state
should be the complete liquidation of the bureaucracy lifting itself
above society. In actual fact, however, the new constitution raises
exactly the opposite process of development to a law. Nor can it
be otherwise. The growth of privileges requires a gendarme for
their supervision.
12. State coercion is not being attenuated, according to the new
constitution, but on the contrary is acquiring an exceptionally
concentrated, open, and cynical character. The soviets are
destroyed. The local and central, that is, the "municipal" and
"parliamentary" institutions, built up on the basis of the
plebiscitary system, have nothing in common with the soviets as
the fighting organizations of the toiling masses. Besides, they
have been deprived in advance of all genuine significance. The
new constitution officially and publicly unites the power and
control over all fields of economic and cultural life in the hands of
the Stalinist "party," which is independent both of the people and
of its own members and which represents a political machine of
the ruling caste.
13. In passing, the constitution liquidates de jure the ruling
position of the proletariat in the state, a position which, de facto,
has long been liquidated. Henceforth, it is declared, the dictator
ship is "classless" and "popular," which, from the Marxian
standpoint, is pure nonsense. The dictatorship of the "people"
over itself should have signified the dissolution of the state into
society, that is, the death of the state. In reality, the new
constitution seals the dictatorship of the privileged strata of
So viet society o ver the producing masses, thereby making the
peaceful dying away of the state an impossibility, and opens up
for the bureaucracy "legal" roads for the economic counterrevolu
tion, that is, the restoration of capitalism by means of a "cold
stroke," a possibility for which the bureaucracy directly prepares
by its deception about the "victory" of socialism." It is our task to
call upon the working class to oppose its own strength to the
pressure of the bureaucracy-for the defense of the great
conquests of October.
14. In direct contradiction to the official lie, the new constitu
tion not only does not extend Soviet "democracy" but on the
contrary confirms its total strangulation. By every one of its
paragraphs it proclaims that the present masters of the situation
will not voluntarily relinquish their positions to the people. The
aristocratic and absolutist character of the new constitution is
most clearly expressed in the new crusade announced on the day
of its publication-the crusade for the " extermination of the
enemies of the people, the Trotskyist vermin and furies" (Pravda,
June 5, 1936). The bureaucracy is very clearly aware of whence
comes the mortal danger that threatens it and it directs the
Bonapartist terror against the representatives of the proletarian
vanguard.
15. The working class of the USSR has been robbed of the last
possibility of a legal reformation of the state. The struggle
against the bureaucracy necessarily becomes a revolutionary
struggle. True to the traditions of Marxism, the Fourth Interna
tional decisively rejects individual terror, as it does all other
means of political adventurism. The bureaucracy can be smashed
only by means of the goal-conscious movement of the masses
against the usurpers, parasites, and oppressors.
If a social counterrevolution-i.e., the overthrow of state
ownership of the means of production and of the land as well as
the reestablishment of private property-is necessary for the

return of the USSR to capitalism, then for the further develop
ment of socialism a political revolution has become inevitable,
i.e., the violent overthrow of the political rule of the degenerated
bureaucracy while maintaining the property relations established
by the October Revolution. The proletarian vanguard of the
USSR, basing itself upon the toiling masses of the whole country
and upon the revolutionary movement of the whole world, will
have to batter down the bureaucracy by force, restore Soviet
democracy, eliminate the enormous privileges, and assure a
genuine advance to socialist equality.
16. On the question of war, as on all other questions, the
parties of the Fourth International do not permit themselves to be
guided by formalistic and idealistic considerations and sympa
thies, but only by Marxian criteria. If, for example, they support
Ethiopia, despite the slavery that still prevails there and despite
the barbaric political regime, it is, in the first place, because an
independent national state represents a progressive historical
stage for a pre c apitalist country and, secondly, because the defeat
of Italy would signify the beginning of the collapse of the
obsolescent capitalist society.
The proletarian vanguard of the entire world will support the
USSR in war, in spite of the parasitic bureaucracy and of the
uncrowned negus in the Kremlin, because the social regime of the
USSR, despite all its deformations and ulcers, represents an
enormous historical step forward in comparison with putrefied
capitalism. The defeat of an imperialist land in the new war will
lead to the collapse not only of its state form but also of its
capitalist foundation, and consequently will also replace private
by state property. The defeat of the Soviet Union would not only
signify the collapse of the Soviet bureaucracy but also the
replacement of state and collective property by capitalist chaos.
The choice of political line under these conditions is inescapable.
The resolute and intrepid support of the USSR by the world
proletarian vanguard in a war does not, however, signify that the
proletariat should become the ally of the imperialist allies of the
USSR. "The proletariat of a capitalist country that finds itself in
an alliance with the USSR must retain fully and completely its
irreconcilable hostility to the imperialist government of its own
country" ( War and the Fourth International, Theses of the
International S ecretariat of the International Communist
League, Bolshevik-Leninists, point 44). "Intransigent proletarian
opposition to the imperialist ally must develop, on the one hand,
on the basis of international class policy, on the other, on the
basis of the imperialist aims of the given government, the

treacherous character of this 'alliance,' its speculation on
capitalist overturn in the USSR, etc. The policy of a proletarian
party in an 'allied' as well as an enemy imperialist country
should therefore be directed towards the revolutionary overthrow
of the bourgeoisie and the seizure of power. Only in this way can
a real alliance with the USSR be created and the first workers'
state be saved from disaster" (ibid. point 45).
1 7 . The fears of the "ultraleftists" that the victory of the USSR
may lead to the further consolidation of the positions of the
Bonapartist bureaucracy arise out of a false conception of
international relationships as well as of the internal development
of the USSR. The imperialists of all camps will not reconcile
themselves with the Soviet Union until private property in the
means of production has been reestablished. Whatever the
grouping of states may be at the beginning of the war, the
imperialists will, in the course of the war, know how to come to
an understanding and to a regrouping among themselves, always
at the expense of the USSR. The USSR will be able to emerge
from a war without a defeat only under one condition, and that is
if it is assisted by the re volution in the West or in the East. But
the international revolution, the only way of saving the USSR,
will at the same time signify the death-blow for the Soviet
bureaucracy.
18. Is the USSR a workers' state? The USSR is a state which
bases itself upon the property relationships created by the
proletarian revolution and which is administered by a l abor
bureaucracy in the interests of new privileged strata. The Soviet
Union can be called a workers' state in approximately the s ame
sense-despite the vast difference in scale-in which a trade
union, led and betrayed by opportunists , that is, by agents of
capital, can be called a workers' organization. Just as revolution
ists defend every trade union, even the most thoroughly
reformist, from the class enemy, combating intransigently the
treacherous leaders at the same time, so the p arties of the Fourth
International defend the USSR against the blows of imperialism
without for a single moment giving up the struggle against the
reactionary Stalinist apparatus. In war as in peace, they guard
their full freedom of criticism of the ruling Soviet caste and their
full freedom of struggle against its agreements with the
imperialists at the expense of the interests of the USSR and of the
international revolution .
FOR A COMMON GOAL I N BRITAIN 36 8
July 1 3, 1936
Dear Comrades:
The situation in Europe is becoming so serious that the British
comrades of the three existing groups must search and find a way
toward a common goal. The coming international conference
opens up very important possibilities in this direction. Your
participation in the conference seems to me to be an absolute
necessity.
You have, I understand, certain hesitations concerning organi
zational obligations toward the International Secretariat, an d so
forth. But now a new organizational situation will be created. The
conference has as its aim the constitution of a new directing body
for all the p arties, organizations , and groups adhering to the
Fourth International. You have the opportunity to participate
either as a regular member or as a sympathizing organization,
should you find it impossible to assume all the obligations. It is
excluded, I am sure, that the conference should attempt to impose
upon the English comrades a rigid line of policy to be followed by
them. But the p articipation of our best international comrades in
a special British commission, including the delegates of the three
British groups, can greatly accelerate the rapprochement and
fructify their future activity with new points of view, new
methods , and so forth.
I agree with you that the most important question is that of
work in the trade unions , and that the ILP in this respect is
becoming more of a handicap than an aid. But in the trade
unions we must work not as freelancers but as an organized
fraction (with all the necessary caution with respect to the trade
union bureaucracy). Your participation in the international
conference ought to facilitate the constitution of such a united
fraction. I am sure you will send your representative.
With my best greetings,
Fraternally yours,
L. Trotsky
361
THE DUTCH SECTION
AND THE INTERNATIONAL369
July 1 5-16, 1 936
To the Central Committee of the RSAP
Dear Comrades:
1 reply herewith to your letter of July 11, unfortunately with
one day's delay caused by unfavorable circumstances.
1. You write that you are ready to send two delegates to the
conference ("if the organizational affairs will be considered as the
first point"). For my part, naturally, 1 am not opposed to dealing
with the organizational affairs at any point, even the first, if that
appears necessary. However the question can only be decided by
the conference itself and 1 do not see how this matter could be
decided in advance. Since 1 cannot consider your letter as an
ultimatum to a not yet convened conference, 1 conceive the matter
in this light, that you reserve the right to insist at the conference
itself that the organizational question be advanced to the first
point. Despite the fact that such a procedure seems to me quite
irregular and conflicts with my whole experience, 1 would not
make this matter a disputed question, and, as for myself, 1 would
accept your proposal.
Unfortunately, I do not see any concrete proposals on your
part. That our international organization reveals great defects is
indisputable; many of these defects, 1 hope, can be remedied,
especially if the Dutch party henceforth does what is necessary in
international organizational work. The most important weak
nesses, however, lie in the very nature of our organization, since
it is persecuted by all governments. We have no freedom of
movement. A part of our leading comrades are in the position of
political emigres (I, for example, am among them). This is
something that just cannot be talked away.
The Russian leadership was always distributed between two
and often enough three centers . The bulk of the Central
362
The Dutch Section and the International 363
Committee was in Russia. The emigrants, among then Lenin,

were abroad. Despite that, however, they played a certain role in
the movement, and often a not entirely bad role. Because of the
spatial remoteness, however, there arose at all times difficulties
and frictions, which often assumed threatening forms. This can
now be very well followed with the aid of the published
correspondence carried on for decades.
In Europe, under normal conditions , things were different. But
the good old times are now gone for Europe too. We must adapt
ourselves to very specific conditions, which constantly grow
worse for us all. There is no recipe for this state of affairs to be
found anywhere. If one puts great store in mutual collaboration,
one must also take into consideration the negative sides of the
certain organizational dispersal that exists.
The preconference in Berne was proposed precisely for the
purpose of making the work of the conference in Geneva as
profitable and smooth as possible. I waited a month and a half
for this conference. Unfortunately, it did not take place. Also,
neither I nor anyone else has, to this day, received any
organizational proposals. It is always hard to treat proposals at a
conference when they h ave not been brought to the attention of
the conference participants in advance. For you will surely
understand that it is not only your party that is interested in
considering all the important questions beforehand, but also the
other organizations. Yet you make the matter still harder by the
fact that in your last letter you do not describe by a single word
what you regard as organizational questions.
Nevertheless-as stated-I would be prepared, for my part, to
devote half of the first day to organizational questions, at least in
order to introduce the discussion and to acquaint those present
with what the concrete proposals consist of. Then, if final
decisions are not immediately arrived at, a commission could be
formed to prepare proposals, which could then be brought to the
latter half of the closing day of the conference for discussion and
final decision. In any case, all these are only suggestions-not
binding-on my part.
2. The most important question, however, is the French
revolution. I greatly regret, dear comrades, that I find nothing
about it in your letter, and unfortunately much too little in your
paper. The fate of E urope, of Holland included and thereby also
of your party, is being decided today not in Holland but in
France.
I recall that about a year or a year and a half ago there was an
editorial comment in De Nieuwe Fakkel to an article by a

comrade of the Bolshevik-Leninists, with approximately the
following content (I do not have the paper at hand): We do not
agree "that the French situation is more important than the
German or English . " This way of putting the question is abstract
and therefore incorrect. It is not a question of the comparison of
the historical importance of the various countries , but of the
correct evaluation of the revolutionary world conjuncture. The
fate of the European working class for decades to come is being
decided today in France. Our French section-despite all its
difficulties and weaknesses, which I know very well-has become
a historical factor which far overshadows all the other sections.
To refuse to perceive this would be, at least in my eyes, a
symptom of opportunistic blindness. We must s upport our French
section with all o ur forces, more than our other national sections
and organizations, for if we take a great step forward in France
in the course of the coming months, it will be of immeasurable
significance in all the other countries as well-for example, for
the impending Dutch elections. If I might translate my thought
into the language of commerce, 100 gulden invested now in
France would, in the coming period, yield a greater interest than
1 ,000 gulden in Holland, Russia, or England. That is why I see
with a certain apprehension the fact that you actually overlook
the question , and even make your participation in the conference
dependent, to a certain degree, upon general " organizational"
questions which we shall settle and which we shall always have
to settle over again in the course of years to come. I regarded the
conference in the first place as the gathering of the international
staff for the purpose of making the French question the
international question, and that in every respect.
3. It seems to you superfluous to have to adopt a position
toward the London Bureau at the conference. Under no circum
stances can I express my agreement with this. The worst obstacle
for us, the most malignant enemy, is the London Bureau and its
affiliated organizations. Your cartoonist, whom I always admire,
recently depicted the Second and Third Internationals as two
dogs let loose upon the Fourth International by imperialism.
Unfortunately, he forget to present the small, mangy cur who
scampers around our legs, snarls at us, snaps at our heels and
seeks by this to prevent us from finishing off the big dogs. This is
no subordinate question. What the SAP-ILPists signify in a
revolutionary period is shown again by Marceau Pivert and
Godefroid in France and in Belgium . The ILPists are not one whit
better than the SAPists. This they have amply demonstrated by

their evolution in the last two years. As the situation becomes
more threatening and more filled with responsibility, the more
reactionary and-to us-more inimical do all these old, slick,
incorrigible opportunists and pacifists become. One does not fight
for the Fourth International by flirting with them in a closed
room, by attendance upon them, by parlor visits to them, etc.-for
all this only gives them an exaggerated opinion of their own
importance and incites them to further invasions into our own
ranks; no, one fights for the Fourth International only by
pitilessly exposing these little gentlemen and calling them by
their right name.
4. Let us take the ILP question . I really cannot reproach myself
with any precipitateness on this question . For years I followed
the evolution of this party quite calmly and objectively. After
Schmidt's and Paton's visit to me, from which I learned a great
deal,370 I wrote a series of articles and letters of an entirely
friendly kind to the ILP people, sought to enter into personal
contact with them, and counseled our English friends to join the
ILP in order, from within, to go through the experience
systematically and to the very end. Since the last visit of
Comrades R. and A.,371 I formulated my observations in this
sense: that there isn't much to be done with the ILP. The three of
us worked out a definite proposal for our British comrades (a
manifesto to the party, collection of signatures, etc.). Comrade
Schmidt went to England and judged the plan to be incorrect.
Naturally, this was not without its influence on the comrades, as
well as on me. I immediately said to myself: S chmidt knows the
situation in the ILP better than I do; perhaps he sees in the ILP
such aspects as escape me; therefore the decision should perhaps
be postponed in order to see the effect of the l atest big events (the
war in Ethiopia, etc.) at the coming party conference of the ILP.
To lose two to three months in a critical period is always a great
loss. But it seemed to me, after Comrade Schmidt's intervention,
that it was necessary to go through this new experience.
Well, it is now already behind us. To continue now with an
effort to revive an illusion which has been shattered to bits would
be nothing less than to inflict a bad service on the cause. In times
of calm, one can live on illusions for a long p eriod; in a perio d of
crisis, if one does not take into account the h ard facts-that is,
the actual policy of centrism and pacifism, and consequently
their deeds-but considers one's own wishes and sentiments, one
courts the danger of becoming the shadow of the centrists and
pacifists and of compromising and destroying one's own

organization. That is why I deem it absolutely necessary for our
comrades to break openly with the ILP and to transfer to the
Labour Party where, as is shown especially by the experience in
the youth, much more can be accomplished.
5. You complain in your letter that many parties have c arried
through tactical turns without preceding international discussion
and decision. This complaint does not appear correct to me,
especially to the extent that it refers to the American party. The
discussion there was extended for more than a year, and
moreover it was based upon the previous French discussion and
experience. The discussion had an international character. All
sections, without exception, took a position on it. The American
friends knew quite well the sentiments that prevailed in the
various sections. Naturally, they could not carry out an
international referendum. At the last moment the leadership,
considering the situation at the time as highly favorable, took the
'
decision upon itself. It would not have been worthy of the name of
a revolutionary leadership if it did not have the courage to make
independent decisions. That this leadership is, however, permeat
ed with a truly internationalist spirit is demonstrated by the fact
that two of its representatives [Muste and Shachtman] have come
in order to render an accounting and to take full responsibility for
their conduct before the international forum. This seems to me to
be genuine internationalism.
6. We cannot make any claim to leading our national sections
directly from a center, even if this center were much more united
than it is at present. Within the bounds of the united program
and the common political line, every section must necessarily lay
claim to a certain elbow room in which to act. I am a little
surprised that I am obliged to say this to the Dutch friends, who,
up to now, have carried on their policy absolutely independently
and in many important questions in direct contradiction with the
firm opinion of the international organization. In this respect, we
have always showed the greatest caution and-if you permit-the
greatest forbearance, especially toward the Dutch party. We
shall, I hope, also do this in the future. But we retain the right to
our opinion, if not publicly (as was the case with De Nieuwe
Fakkel with reference to Belgium, and quite wrongly), then at
least within the bounds of the organization.
Unfortunately-and this is a reproach that I must direct
primarily at my dear friend Sneevliet-the D utch leadership is
impregnated with the spirit of the greatest intolerance toward
any criticism. The policy of our American or Belgian friends, to

say nothing of the Germans, may be sharply criticized and
rej ected. But if one attempts to raise the trade union policy of the
fraternal Dutch party, even if only in intimate circles, one is
repulsed with the greatest sharpness.
Precisely this spirit, which is by no means the spirit of
reciprocity, evoked >dissatisfaction among very many comrades,
and very good ones, in all sections, and this dissatisfaction is
justified! It lies in the interest both of the general cause and of the
Dutch leadership to dispel this long accumulating dissatisfaction
by means of a calm and friendly exposition at the conference and
to stop making a "taboo" out of Dutch questions. This also
belongs among the "organizational" questions that you want to
have dealt with as the first point.
I must unfortunately interrupt the letter in order to catch the

airmail in time. You will get the second half of the letter
tomorrow. I hasten, however, to s ay here that I have not the
remotest desire or shadow of a desire to lose contact with you, to
render the already difficult position of the Dutch party more
difficult, or-parenthetically-to dim my friendship with Sneev
liet; I need not assure you of that. I have urged a personal
meeting since my arrival in Norway. If I were not bound hand
and foot I would have visited Holland two or three times this
year, for I put the greatest stock in personal discussions,
especially with older and experienced comrades, in these fateful
times. It was a holiday at our house when I received the letter
that Comrades Schmidt and Stien de Zeeuw wanted to take a trip
here.372 I immediately expressed my joy over this prospect in a
letter to Schmidt. Unfortunately, nothing came of it. Sneevliet too
promised me a visit, but unfortunately did not keep his promise. I
do not want to level reproaches on this score, despite the fact that
Comrade Schmidt visited the ILP two, if not three, times during
this period. In the letter to Shachtman I only wanted to
emphasize that a subsequent personal meeting could not replace
the official conference and that your nonparticipation in the
conference at a time like this would inevitably be interpreted by
the whole public as a political rupture with all our organizations.
Fortunately, your p articipation now seems to me to be assured
and therewith we can calmly discuss the "official" and the
personal matters.
With fraternal greetings,
Crux [L. Trotsky]
July 1 6 , 1936
7. I now come to Spain. In one of his most recent letters,
Comrade Sneevliet in the name of the Central Committee of the
party took up the defense of the Maurin-Nin party against my
allegedly exaggerated or too sharp attacks .373 This appears to me
to be not only unjustified but also incomprehensible. The struggle
with Maurin does not date from yesterday. His entire policy
during the revolution was nationalistic-provincial and petty
bourgeois; reactionary in its entire essence. I recorded this fact
publicly more than once from the beginning of the revolution OD.
Nin too, with the vacillations typical of him, acknowledged this.
The program of the "democratic socialist" revolution is a
legitimate child of the Maurinist spirit; it corresponds essentially
to the program of a Blum and not of a Lenin.
As for Nin, during the whole revolution he proved to be a
completely passive dilettante who does not in the slightest degree
think of actually participating in the mass struggle, of winning
the masses , of leading them to the revolution, etc. He contented
him::;elf with hypercritical little articles on Stalinists, on Social
ists, etc. This is now a very cheap commodity! During the series
of general strikes in Barcelona he wrote me letters on all
conceivable questions but did not so much as mention the general
strikes and his own role in them. in the course of those years we
exchanged hundreds of letters. I always tried to elicit from him
not empty literary observations on everything and nothing, but
practical suggestions for the revolutionary struggle. To my
concrete questions, he always replied: "as to that, I shall write in
my next letter." This "next letter," however, never arrived-for
years .
The greatest misfortune for the Spanish section was the fact
that a man with a name, with a certain past and the halo of a
martyr of Stalinism, stood at its head and all the while led it
incorrectly and paralyzed it.
The splendid Socialist Youth came spontaneously to the idea of
the Fourth International. To all our urgings that all attention be
devoted to the Socialist Youth, we received only hollow evasions.
Nin was concerned with the "independence" of the Spanish
section, that is, with his own passivity, with his own petty
political comfort; he didn't want his captious dilettantism to be
disturbed by great events. The Socialist Youth then passed over
almost completely into the Stalinist camp. The lads who called
themselves Bolshevik-Leninists and who permitted this, or better
yet, who caused this, have to be stigmatized forever as criminals
against the revolution.
At the moment when Nin's bankruptcy became clear even to

his own supporters, he united with the nationalist-Catalonian
philistine Maurin, breaking off all relations with us by the
declaration that "the IS understands nothing of Spanish affairs ."
In reality Nin understands nothing of revolutionary policy or of
Marxism.
The new party soon fo und itself in the tow of Azana. But to say
about this fact, "it is only a small, temporary technical electoral
agreement," seems to me to be absolutely inadmissible. The p arty
undersigned the most miserable of all People's Front programs of
Azana and simultaneously also its death sentence for years to
come. For at every attempt at criticism of the People's Front (and
Maurin-Nin are now making such desperate attempts) they will
always receive the stereotyped reply from the Radical bom:geois,
from the Social Democrats, and from the Communists: But didn't
you yourselves take part in the creation of the People's Front and
sign its program? And if these gentlemen then try to make use of
the rotten subterfuge, "it was only a technical maneuver of our
party"-they will only make themselves ridiculous.
These people have completely paralyzed themselves, even if
they were now unexpectedly to display a revolutionary will,
which is not, however, the case. Small crimes and betrayals,
which remain almost unobserved in normal times, find a mighty
repercussion in time of revolution. It should never be forgotten
that the revolution creates special acoustic conditions. All in all, I
cannot understand how it is that extenuating circumstances are
sought for the Spanish betrayers, while at the same time our
Belgian friends, who are fighting with preeminent courage
against the enormous POB machine and the Stalinists, and who
have quite substantial successes to show, are publicly disparaged
in De Nieuwe Fakkel.
8. In the latest number of La Batalla [newspaper of the FOUM]
there is an appeal of the Maurin-Nin party to our South American
sections, which represents an attempt to group the latter around
the so-called "Party of Marxist Unification" on a purely national
basis. Like every section of the London Bureau, the Spanish
"Marxist" party of confusion tries to penetrate into the ranks of
the Fourth International, to split them, etc. There you have the
little cur who snaps at our heels. Must we not say openly to our
South American organizations, which still have in their ranks
SAPist parliamentarians, etc., what the difference is between us
and the London Bureau and why Nin breaks with us in E urope
and wants to appear in South America as the pious unifier of all
the revolutionary forces? This contemptible hypocrisy, which
always characterized centrism, must be mercilessly exposed. This

alone would suffice to prove the absolute necessity of our theses
on the London Bureau.
9. The question of questions at present is the People's Front.
The left centrists seek to present this question as a tactical or
even as a technical maneuver, so as to be able to peddle their
wares in the shadow of the People's Front. In reality, the People's
Front is the main question of proletarian class s trategy for this
epoch. It also offers the best criterion for the difference between
Bolshevism and Menshevism. For it is often forgotten that the
greatest historical example of the People's Front is the February
1917 revolution. From February to October, the Mensheviks and
Social Revolutionaries, who represent a very good parallel to the
"Communists" and Social Democrats, were in the closest alliance
and in a permanent coalition with the bourgeois party of the
Cadets, together with whom they formed a series of coalition
governments. Under the sign of this People's Front stood the
whole mass of the people, including the workers', peasants', and
soldiers' councils. To be sure, the Bolsheviks participated in the
councils. But they did not make the slightest concession to the
People's Front. Their demand was to break this People's Front, to
destroy the alliance with the Cadets, and to create a genuine
workers' and peasants' government.
All the People's Fronts in Europe are only a pale copy and often
a caricature of the Russian People's Front of 1917, which could
after all lay claim to a much greater justification for its existence,
for it was still a question of the struggle against czarism and the
remnants of feudalism. If Maslow and Dubois now flirt with the
People's Front,374 with all their ultraleftist "intransigence," then
they only prove thereby that they have not understood the real
strategic antagonism between Bolshevism and Menshevism.
They demanded that we raise the slogan "People's Front to
power," that is, demand power for the coalition of workers and
capitalists. At the same time they made merry over our demand
"Bourgeoisie out of the People's Front!" Hemmed in somewhat
with reservations, these thoughts are also to be found in an
article of Maslow's in the theoretical journal of the Dutch party.
For my part I can only regret this, for this fact makes the most
painful impression on all of us. Do we have differences of opinion
on this question, where it is a matter of choice between
Bolshevism and Menshevism? Yes or no? I hope not! Then
whence this inexplicable tolerance for Maslow's thoroughly
opportunistic conceptions?
The position of our French section on all the important

questions is incomparably more correct and Marxian, even
though there is no sparing of criticism of the French section in
our own ranks, as you may see from the pamphlet of Nicolle
Braun.375 Yet I must say that the text of the French Central
Committee, "Where is the Blum government going?" is an
excellent piece of work, which is worth translating into all the
languages of the Fourth International. As for me personally, I
learned a good deal from this pamphlet. Yet our French comrades
are so poor (for which they themselves bear the blame in large
measure) that they were unable to publish the pamphlet in
printed, but only in mimeographed, form.
10. Permit me now to pass over to the Dutch party. I do not
read Dutch. I only halfway decipher the titles, a few sentences,
and if the m atter appears important to me other comrades come
to my aid. I can therefore lay no claim at all to competence on the
Dutch question. Nevertheless , I follow as much as possible, by
means of the European press , the life of Holland, and I am in
correspondence with my friend Sneevliet (insofar as he replies to
my letters , which is not the rule, unfortunately) , etc. What I say
about the D utch party can therefore only be incomplete and
fragmentary:
(a) The great weakness of the Dutch party seems to me to be
the lack of a program of action. For more than a year we have
had an exchange of opinions with Sneevliet on this score. Insofar
as I may permit myself a j udgment, the agitation of the party
seems to me to rest far too much upon personal improvisations,
upon impressions of the day or week, and therefore bears a
dispersed, diluted, and not a concentrated character. A reformist
party can easily reconcile itself to such a situation, but not a
revolutionary party like the RSAP, for it can fight successfully
against and finally trumph over the large parties only by means
of the clarity and concentratedness of the slogans it has
elaborated for the whole present epoch.
Several months ago the Dutch party formed a commission to
elaborate a program of action. The commission laid out, so at
least it appeared to me, too extensive and too comprehensive a
plan. For my p art I proposed to separate the plan into two p arts:
first to work out a brief but conclusive program of action for
Holland, and then to elaborate the large program in connection
with other s ections as the program of the Fourth International.
Comrade Sneevliet-if I remember righly-was also of this
opinion. Unfortunately it does not appear that this commission
has yet produced a single draft. At any rate, I have received none,
as was promised me. It is highly regrettable that, among other
things, for the impending elections, we have not armed ourselves
in good enough time with a sharp program of action.
(b) On the trade union question too I cannot share the policy of
our fraternal Dutch party. The reasons for that I have often set
forth in writing and especially verbally. The policy toward the
NAS continues to be carried out only on the b asis of the law of
inertia. There is no deeper strategic motivation for it. Develop
ments in Holland, just as is now the case in France, will have to
strike out either on the revolutionary or on the fascist road. In
either case I see no place for the NAS. When the great strike wave
begins in Holland, which should be regarded as highly probable
if not certain, the reformist trade unions will grow mightily and
absorb fresh elements into their ranks, and in such a period the
NAS will appear to the masses as an incomprehensible splinter
organization. In consequence, the masses will also become
unreceptive to the correct slogans of the RSAP and the leadership
of the NAS. But if all the members of the RSAP and the best NAS
elements were inside the reformist trade unions, then during the
impending upsurge they could b ecome the axis of crystallization
of the left wing and later on the decisive force in the labor
movement. I must say quite openly: systematic, solicitously
arranged agitation inside the reformist trade unions seems to me
the only means not only of preserving the RSAP as a genuinely
independent party (for by itself this hasn't any historical value),
but also of carrying it to victory, that is, to power.
If we take a much less probable alternative, namely, that
developments in Holland, without passing through a revolution
ary upsurge, go directly, in the coming period, into the
reactionary military-bureaucratic and then into the fascist phase,
we nevertheless come to the s ame conclusion: the NAS policy
must become an obstacle to the party. The first assault of
reaction has already been directed at the NAS and cost it half its
membership. The second assault will cost it its life. The excellent
workers united within it will then have to seek the road into the
reformist trade unions in a dispersed manner, everyone for
himself, or else remain passive and indifferent. The trade union
cannot lead the illegal existence that the party can. But by means
of this blow the party will be terribly hit, for an illegal
revolutionary party must have a legal or semilegal mass cover. If
the bulk of the membership of the RSAP is active in the reformist
trade unions, then these mass organizations mean for the p arty
too a hiding place, a cover, and at the same time an arena. The
coherence of the present NAS workers is thereby preserved. All
other points will be conditioned by the course of developments
and by the policy of the party.
(c) On the youth question, the policy of the party does not seem
to me to be sufficiently clear. I know that at the head of the Dutch
youth we have very good and very promising elements. They
must, however, find their field of activity so as not to persist and
to wither away in the abstract-sectarian existence of "would-be
know-it-all . " This field of work can be found only in the trade
unions and among the reformist youth. If we continue to waste
time, the Dutch youth will fall victim to Stalinism, as is the case
in Spain and to a substantial degree also in England. In Belgium,
despite the tardiness and despite the much too irresolute,
vacillating policy, certain successes were nevertheless achieved
against Godefroid among the youth. In America, the Socialist
youth, which certainly does not represent a strong organization,
has, thanks to the correct policy of our American cothinkers,
received a good anti-Stalinist inoculation and now finds itself on
the right road. It would really be disastrous if our Dutch youth
section were not to understand that it must immediately devote
all its forces to work within the reformist youth!
I know, dear comrades, that with many of these observations I
come into sharp conflict with the views of certain leading circles
of the RSAP. Nor do I lay the slightest claim, not only for myself
(that would be altogether out of the question) but also not for the
impending international conference, to the right to alter, in a
trice, the position of the RSAP on the decisive questions. As in all
of our sections, the necessary change can only mature from
within. The other sections can only be of assistance therein, by
means of responsible criticism. This letter has no other aim. What
we now need is an open discussion on these questions with the
Dutch friends in order to promote mutual understanding. For
example, I put no concrete proposals to the conference on the
Dutch trade union questions and would advise against adopting
any binding decision. Our general line in the trade union
question must be put clearly. I sought to do this in a few lines in
the draft on the Franco-Belgian situation. Perhaps, too, indepen
dent trade union theses will be submitted. At all events it would
be false to make an organizational ultimatum to the Dutch party
out of this question. As unanimously and unambiguously as
possible we state our opinion on the trade union question in
general and fix this opinion in writing. We discuss openly with
the Dutch comrades as to their perspectives. But we respect the

special situation in Holland and leave to the Dutch comrades the
working out of the necessary methods in the trade union
question. This is the formal proposal that I put to the conference.
1 1 . In conclusion, I should still like to say what is necessary on
my letter to Shachtman: how and why did I write this letter? The
initiative for the conference came from Berne on April 1 1 . The
correspondence developed in the course of April and the
convocation was planned for the month of June. Thus, nobody
can talk of any "precipitation" whatsoever. The fisherman's
strike, I believe, did not begin in April or even in May. In any
case, every country now has its strikes and its mass movements
and if we were to wait with the international conference until
complete calm prevails in every country, we would never be able
to hold a conference. Financial and personal difficulties exist
everywhere also. All the larger sections were agreed on the
necessity of convoking the conference. Only the Dutch section
gave evasive answers. In that connection it did not refer so much
to the fishermen's strike as it did to the-in its eyes-wrong
policy of the American section, to the deficiencies of the IS, to the
weaknesses of the French section, etc . , etc. Just at the time when
we were taking p art with the greatest ardor in the work of
preparing the conference, of elaborating the theses, etc., there
appeared in De Nieuwe Fakkel a deplorable note on the Belg;. an
section; also, the report on the persecution of the French section
was written in such a manner as to give the appearance of
wanting to deprecate the importance of the French section. I
received a letter in which Comrade Sneevliet, in the name of the
Dutch Central Committee, censured me for my article against
Maurin-Nin.
Although the Dutch Central Committee did not give a definite
answer to the question of its participation in the conference, it
proposed to us to take part "in a few months" in a conference
planned by the London Bureau. Everyone who thinks politically
will h ave to admit that these facts give sufficient cause for
concern. The whole enterprise hung in midair for weeks and we
were unable to send the American friends the promised telegram
announcing the date. Finally, they came to Europe on their own
initiative without awaiting the telegram. This fact created a force
majeure, so to speak, for the organizers of the conference. After
all, we could not let tpe American comrades return home empty
handed. Right after Comrade Erik [Muste] arrived here, I
promptly sent Sneevliet a telegram. For more than fortyeight
hours we received no reply to it. So I sent a second, still more
urgent telegram. This was finally answered with the promise of a

communication by m ail. I communicated my disquiet and my
apprehension to Comrade Erik in a most moderate and reserved
manner and asked him to plead emphatically before the Dutch
comrades for their participation in the conference.
Comrade Erik had to leave us before the planned preconference
could be held. After his departure, a letter from Comrade
Shachtman arrived from Amsterdam, the contents of which
boiled down to the fact that even now, after the arrival of the
Americans, the Dutch comrades were still unable to decide in
favor of participation in the conference, that they proposed a
personal meeting with me for the second half of August, and that
they m ade their participation in some eventual conference in the
autumn more or less dependent upon the results of this
conversation. Naturally, it would have been more advantageous
to wait for the report of Comrade Erik on his conversations. And
that was my first thought. But then I said to myself: if Comrade
Erik gets the same answer as Shachtman, then, after receiving
his reports, there will no longer be any possibility of saving the
cause of the conference. I had to say that to myself.
In the light of the present situation, especially in France, and
considering the arrival of the Americans, I cannot of course
explain to myself the attitude of the Dutch comrades on the
grounds of lack of funds or of the fishermen's strike, but on much
deeper political grounds : many leading Dutch comrades believe
they can be of service to the Fourth International by contact with
the London Bureau, that is, by collaboration with the latter and
not by means of unremitting struggle against it. For a great
number of comrades , however, contact with the London Bureau
signifies nothing but a break with the Fourth International. I
considered it absolutely necessary to bring to the attention of the
Dutch comrades this deepgoing difference of opinion before they
adopt their final decision.
The sense of my letter was: If, despite the experience already
acquired, you put stock in sitting down at one table with the SAP
ILP, etc., then you should at least take a seat at one table with us
before that, in order to confer with us on this question, which-for
us-is so important and decisive. Let us hope that after all we can
come to a common decision. But if you come neither to the
preconference nor to the conference itself, and further develop
your connections with the London Bureau, then we cannot
evaluate the consequences of such a procedure in any other way
than as an inevitable break with us.
In this critical situation I deemed it necessary to express my
opinio n , quite openly and without embellishment, on the possible

consequences of the non participation of the Dutch friends in the
conference. This I did in the letter to S h achtman and I also sent a
copy of the letter to Sneevliet. And I said to myself: if the Dutch
comrades have finally come to the decision to seek an entirely
different road to the new International than ours , then my letter
will no longer hurt. B u t if their way of action is to be explained
only by the fact that they do not ascribe suffi cient importance to
the thing (which I also already grasped as a disquieting
symptom ) , then my letter will call their atten tion to the fact that
for us the m atter is of decisive importance. The Dutch comrades
will then surely utter many a stron g word about the letter; but
their positions will be determined not b y the questi o n o f etiquette
but by the deep essence of the situation created. In addition I said
to myself: Erik is fortun ately still in Am sterd am. He will surely
do everything to neutralize the negative psychological consequen
ces of m y intervention . But his intervention will have all the more
positive results the more clearly, open ly, and brusq uely the whole
situation is disclosed.
For my letter, therefore, I and I alone bear respon sibility . I am
quite ready to take any censure for it, regardless of whom it
comes fro m , and let it fal l on my sho ulders . To "insult" anyone
was , obviously, not my in tention . It was not a question of m oral
charges, but of apprehensions arising out of the existence of two
contrary lines . If an "insult" can be read out of my l etter, I am
prepared to withdraw an expression that may give any cause for
it and to apologize, for it is really not a question of etiquette but of
the French revolution and the Fourth I ntern ational.
These are my explanations, dear comrades . I greatly regret that
I cannot meet with you in Geneva, for I am certain that a
personal discussion would eliminate every shadow of discord
between us. But even without my presence, the conference will
surely eliminate the accumulated misunderstandings and create
better conditions for further collaborati o n .
In t h i s spirit I extend you my hand i n all friendship and wis h
you the best of success.
Yo urs ,
Crux [Leon Trotsky]
INTERVIEW ON BRITISH PROBLEMS37 6
Summer 1 936
Question: Should the Marxist Group oppose or favor CP

affiliation to the Labour Party?
A ns wer: The question becomes sheerly pedantic and completely

meaningless in view of the smallness, the weakness , and the lack
of clear perspective in the group itself. However, whatever the
position of the group, it is essential to support critically the
affiliation of the CP-for two reasons: (1) If we refuse support, we
shall be riding against the mass desire for unity; (2) The mistakes
of the CP in the Labour Party and their inevitable alliance with
the bureaucracy will give us the opportunity to win their best
elements . But o nly if we are inside the Labour Party ourselves.
The whole question revolves around the italicized sentence. If
th at is ignored, all speculation is metaphysical and h as nothing
in common with M arxism.
Question: Who do you think is correct-Cooper or Matlow-on

the question of the group perspective?377
A: In my opinion, Matlow is 1 00 percent correct. In view of the

international situation, England must inevitably develop in
common with the rest of Europe. That must give rise to a strike
wave in the near future, which will drive the last nail into the
coffin of the ILP. The ILP is not a mass but a propaganda
organization, and since their propaganda is centrist and not
revolutionary, this dying corpse must be completely swept away
during a working class resurgence. I consider that the rigid,
formalistic position of the Cooper paper has no relationship to
Marxism at all. It shows a complete lack of comprehension of the
class struggle. The idea of remaining inside the ILP for a further
period in order to win a few more wavering elements, while the
CP is rapidly penetrating into the mass organizations, is
377
ridiculous . We can only win these wavering elements in the ILP

by our entry into the Labour Party and the effective work we will
do in there. The waverers remaining in the ILP will inevitably
leave in disgust as the ILP disintegrates further, and in their
attempt to find a new orientation must inevitably come to us in
the Labour Party, if we adopt a correct line at once. The
argument that it is still possible to win a few more of the
waverers in the ILP is sheer formalism, as for every one that we
might win in the ILP there are hundreds in the Labour Party.
The argument that we may be able to capture the apparatus of
the ILP is at best hypothetical, and even if successful must mean
a struggle of years in view of the strength of the bureaucracy. We
do not have eternity before us. We are too generous with our time,
which is very precious; and we are not rich enough to spend it at
such a rate. The experience of the Belgian and French sections
demonstrates conclusively the tremendous possibilities that are
unfolding inside the mass reformist organizations. Unless we
accept that perspective we can play no significant revolutionary
role in the history of Great Britain.
Q: Since we have already missed the opportunity of the

plebiscite issue,378 what issue can we raise in order to split from
the ILP?
A: It is essential to choose a political issue comprehensible to

the broad mass of workers. To raise a fight on the existence of
legal groups within the ILP would be completely useless . I can
only offer some suggestions from this distance. A struggle raised
to commit the ILP on our theses at our recent conference is one
possibility, p articularly the thesis on the revolutionary upsurge,
already printed in the French paper. Possibly, however, a better
example would be the question of the ILP's affiliation to the
Labour Party. That question we must pose immediately, and as
strongly as possible.
Q: Should the group place any conditions upon the entry of the
ILP int, the Labour Party?
A: That kind of knightly courtesy has no place in politics.

Since the ILP bureaucracy has made our group illegal and
suppressed our paper, it would be ridiculous for us to fight for
privileges on behalf of the ILP. Our duty is to get into the Labour
Party with or without the ILP, as rapidly as possible. It is not
Interview on British Pro blems 379
possible for me from this distance to choose either the precise

issue or the time to be taken in the struggle for the split. If we
remember that time is precious and the matter is extremely
urgent, we will not go far wrong. In any event, the suggestion of a
time limit such as the next annual conference of the ILP in April
is incomprehensible to me. The European situation is developing
so rapidly that history will not wait for the ILP conference.
Q: How shall we enter the Labour Party and how shall we work
within it?
A: In view of the weakness of the Marxist Group, it may be

necessary to enter as individuals first and spend one, two, or
three months exploring avenues of work. The important thing is
to get in. Once in, opportunities will rapidly unfold. It is
understood that regardless of how we enter, we will have a secret
faction from the very beginning. Our subsequent actions will
depend on our progress within the Labour Party. It is very
important that we do not lay ourselves open at the beginning to
attacks from the Labour Party bureaucracy, which will result in
our expulsion without our h aving gained any appreciable
strength. Our first attacks must be directed against the inconsis
tency of the centrists, and not the bureaucracy. That again must
be determined by what we find once we are inside. Obviously, we
will not be able to raise the issue of the Fourth International
immediately. History will provide the opportunity for raising that
issue. The question of the Fourth International is not a burning
issue to the masses of Great Britain today. If we take a
revolutionary position on the popular issues that concern the
masses today, then inevitably we will be able to develop toward
the question of the Fourth International. At all costs we must be
very careful to avoid either s ectarianism or opportunism-we
must continually have our fingers on the pulse of the masses. It is
well to remember that as the political situation develops,
revolutionary work will become increasingly dangerous, and we
will be better protected within the broad masses of the Labour
Party than in the isolated and rotting corpse of the ILP, if even a
corpse remains by then. It will undoubtedly be correct to leave a
few capable comrades within the ILP to do fraction work. As
regards the Marxist Group, when we enter the Labour Party a
situation may rapidly arise requiring one or two of our best
speakers to bring forth our complete revolutionary position thus
deliberately inviting expulsion for themselves, as martyrs are
useful to every movement. Such expelled comrades will find

useful avenues of work, e.g., in the Lenin Club.379
Q. Do you think that the idea of the Lenin Club, as developed

by the ILP group, will be useful in our future work within the
Labour Party?
A: That will also depend on the concrete conditions that we find

in the Labour Party, but from this distance it would appear that
it could serve a useful function. But if it is to be of any use, it
must be democratically controlled, with representatives from all
the Bolshevik-Leninists and not merely the ILP group. Anything
else would be pure sectarianism.
Q: Should the paper proposed by James be run as an

independent organ of the acknowledged Trotskyists within the
political organizations such as the Labour Party or as the organ
of the Lenin Club without p arty affiliation?3S0
A: That is difficult to say, as it must obviously depend on

objective conditions. In any case, we must first make every effort
to merge with the Groves-Dewar group in order to utilize Red
Flag.3SJ I understand from Comrade Collins that previous
approaches to Groves-Dewar have met with rebuffs. Even if that
remains true, once we are inside the Labour P arty, the supporters
of Groves-Dewar must realize that we are 1 00 percent with them
and further rebuffs from their two leaders should result in their
coming over to us. In the event of our failure to secure Red Flag
as the organ of our tendency, then we will have to decide which is
better for our work-an independent Lenin Club organ, or a group
paper within the Labour Party. To me this question is not of first
rate importance, as in any case the Stalinists would expose our
connection with a Lenin Club paper. This development on the
part of the Stalinists we can anticipate without any question.
Just as the Labour bureaucracy serves as the police of capitalism
within the ranks of the working class, so the Stalinist leaders will
act as the police of the Labour Party bureaucracy. This iden
tification of the Labour Party and the CP bureaucracies will
afford us an excellent opportunity to win over the rank and file of
the CPo The entire question of a paper and of a Lenin Club
becomes formalistic and unreal while we remain outside the
Labour Party and isolated from the masses .
Interview on British Pro blems 381
Q: What should our attitude be toward Peace Councils?382
A: The question of the Peace Council bears a certain

resemblance to that of the People's Front. For example, in France
we tell the workers that we know the People's Front is all wrong.
While the workers support it, we say to them that we are perfectly
willing to collaborate loyally with the working class organiza
tions, the CP and SP, but we refuse under any circumstances to
have anything to do with the bourgeois p articipants in the
People's Front. We raise the slogan "Down with the Radical
ministers! " We do not shout " Down with the People's Front! " at
present because we have nothing to replace it as yet. In the same
manner, we cannot turn our b acks on the Peace Councils and say
"Down with the Peace Councils!" because as yet there is no
revolutionary party to give a clear lead on the question of war
and peace. In the analogy, however, there is this fundamental
difference. One is a question of state power in a revolutionary
situation. The other is a question of utilizing existing committees
as long as they are supported by mass workers' organizations.
Therefore, it is necessary to get representatives wherever possible
on the Peace Councils and to direct our attacks in the beginning
against certain of the bourgeois participants (who these will be
depends on the reaction of the workers to our propaganda).
It is understood, of course, that the very first task of
revolutionaries in any mass organization is to demand that it be
democratically controlled by the workers. That agitation will give
us our first opportunity of attacking the private invitations given
out by the CP bureaucrats to so-called progressive bourgeois
figures. By attacking the leading bourgeois pacifists and
subsequently the participation of all bourgeois elements, we will
inevitably run counter to the class-collaborationist policies of the
Labour Party-CP bureaucrats. We can then say to the workers:
"We have our differences with Comrades Morrison, Pollitt, and
Lansbury, but we are perfectly willing to work loyally with them.
They, however, wish to expel us because we refuse to work with
open class enemies." This will have the effect of making the
Labour Party-CP bureaucrats bear the responsibility for open
class collaboration before the workers. This situation correctly
used will discredit not only the bureaucrats but also the entire
idea of Peace Councils. But it is first necessary to get on to them.
Q: How can we best deal with the very important colonial

question, a fundamental question which we h ave so far almost

entirely ignored?
A: A study o f the first four congresses of the Comintern is

essential. In addition, the general theses of the Fourth Interna
tional on the colonial question will serve to indicate the general
line, but the concrete application will be determined by the
special situation.
Q: Is it even possible to consider at this stage an independent

existence outside the mass organizations?
A: The fact that Lenin was not afraid to split from Plekhanov
in 1 905 and to remain as a small isolated group bears no weight,
because the same Lenin remained inside the Social Democracy
until 1912 and in 1 920 urged the affiliation of the British CP to
the Labour Party. While it is necessary for the revolutionary
party to maintain its independence at all times, a revolutionary
group of a few hundred comrades is not a revolutionary party and
can work most effectively at present by opposition to the social
patriots within the mass p arties. In view of the increasing
acuteness of the international situation, it is absolutely essential
to be within the mass organizations while there is the possibility
of doing revolutionary work within them. Any such sectarian,
sterile, and formalistic interpretation of Marxism in the present
situation would disgrace an intelligent child of ten.
LET U S KNOW THE FACTS:Hl:!
August 1 5 , 1 9 3 6
At the moment I a m preparing this statement, I d o not h ave

available the original text of the sensational Tass report. I am
familiar with it only through a secondary source. But the main
features of it, which have been transmitted to me, are sufficient to
brand this report immediately as one of the grea test falsifications
in the history of po litics.
The Tass agency speaks of a conspiracy of the so-called
Trotsky-Zinoviev group. The ruling bureaucracy calls every
criticism directed against it a conspiracy. I assume that criticism
is spreading to wider and wider circles in the Soviet Union . This
phenomenon I can only greet with joy. It is quite possible that
many, and quite diverse, elements who represent this critical
feeling have referred to my name-i.e. , to my ideas and my
writings. But the Tass report also declares that the charges
concern a terrorist plot against the leaders of the regime, and that
this conspiracy is directed by me from Norway.
I herewith declare that this contention does not contain a n iota
of truth. To e veryone who is acquainted with recent po litical
history, it is indubitable that the report circula ted by Tass s tands
in sharpes t contradiction to my ideas and to the whole of my
activities, which at the present time a re de voted exclus ively to
writing.
Ever since my entry into the revolutionary movement in 1 8 9 7 , I
h ave been, as h ave all Russian Marxis ts, an uncompromising
opponent of individual terror as a method of struggle, a method
which in the final analysis can only serve the interests of
absolutism and Bonapartism.
I emphatically assert that since I have been in Norway I have
h ad no connections with the Soviet Union-nor have I received a
single letter from the Soviet Union ; neither have I written a
single letter to anybody there either directly or through other
persons.
My sole activity in connection with the Soviet Union has been
383
Fishing outside Kristiansand with friends, August 1936.
Let Us Know the Facts 385
restricted to the writing of articles which were published in the

world press and to a book which will be published in the near
future in several countries. My wife and I have not been able even
once to exchange a single line with our son, who has been
employed in the Soviet Union in a scientific capacity and who
has had no political connections whatsoever.a84
Because I am a man without a country and am now utilizing
the right of asylum in Norway, I believe that the accuracy of the
contention that has been advanced that I have directed a terrorist
conspiracy from Norway can be best determined by the
appointment of a competent government commission which
would investigate the charges contained in the documents . On
my part, I am prepared to furnish such a commission a full
accounting of my activities in N orway-day by day, and hour by
hour. It is also my opinion that this measure could be made more
complete by the nomination of an impartial international
commission by the labor organizations of the entire world, or
better still of its international leaders, to investigate the charges
made in the Soviet Union. This commission could make a public
report of its investigation. I maintain that its report would expose
the charges in all their falsity. I am also prepared to accept any
other method of investigation that would give public opinion a
better explanation of the principal m otives which h ave prompted
the charges against the others and myself. In this matter I have
nothing to fear and nothing to hide. As for myself, I am only
concerned with establishing the truth.
Leon Trotsky
O P E N LETTER TO
THE OSLO CHIEF OF POLICE3 8 5
August 1 9 , 1 93 6
Sir:
Without waiting any longer for the copy of my testimony which
I was promised,386 I have the honor: (1) to send you the copy of
the Nation in question, containing my article, which has been the
subject" of accusations from a certain quarter;387 (2) to supplement
my testimony with the following declaration.
In certain quarters, it is still said that I violated the
commitments to which I freely agreed. I must rej ect this
malicious accusation most energetically.
The conditions which were proposed to me and which I
accepted can only have the following meaning: on the one hand,
that I renounce political activity in Norway and, on the other
hand, that I do no illegal, secret, conspiratorial work affecting
states friendly to Norway. But these conditions in no way
signified or signify that I should renounce open literary activity
in the economic, social, and political field. Literary activity is my
profession, and in my articles and books I can only express
opinions which are my own. I have never hidden my opinions
from anyone. My collaboration with the major world press, and
with magazines (most of which now adhere to the Fourth
International), dates not from my arrival in Norway, but from the
beginning of 1929, that is, the first day I was expelled to Turkey. I
have carried on this literary activity for almost eight years, in
Prinkipo, in France, and recently in Norway, without encounter
ing any objections. I could not and cannot suppose, even for an
instant, that the conditions which I signed are an exceptional
measure applied to me. The same is true for "suspicious visits." I
cannot change the fact that knowing my past causes many
people to wish to see me, some for superficial curiosity, others to
hear my opinions on questions which seem important to them,
not to mention the large proportion of journalists, publishers, etc.
386
Open Letter to the Oslo Chief of Police 387
The very idea that the conditions forbid my receiving visitors is

hardly imaginable. In that case, my stay in Norway would mean
not the exercise of the democratic right of asylum, but imprison
ment, pure and simple.
Such intentions may be attributed to the Norwegian govern
ment by the fascist "accusers"; but they have nothing in common
with my concept of the right of asylum.
In the August 15 issue of A r beiderbladet I find the following
statement by the minister of foreign affairs: "But we had, of
course, a clear understanding that he (i.e., Trotsky) intended to
continue his activities as an author and write expository feature
articles about what was happening in the outside world. That
sort of thing the government did not count as political activity."
In view of this authoritative and perfectly clear statement,
allow me to stress the following fact: Some months after my
arrival, my autobiography was published by the Tiden Norsk
publishing house. Yesterday, after returning to Weksal, I received
from the same publisher a proposal concerning my biography of
Lenin . These books contain the same ideas as my recent articles
in the international press. These distinguished " accusers" could
cite from my books-for example, from my autobiography
hundreds of pages to prove that I am a M arxist and a
revolutionary. But these revelations and discoveries do not in the
least change the fact that I have not participated at all in the
political life of N orway and that my literary activity is conducted
completely in public.
The charge made against me by the Tass agency of Moscow a
few days ago is quite a different m atter. If this charge contained
even a tiny kernel of truth, it would naturally mean a criminal
violation of the conditions of the right of asylum on my part. But
this charge is a separate question. In the coming days, I will
communicate to public opinion all the clarifications at my
disposal on this subject, and I hope to prove that if there is a
crime in this case, it is not one by me against the Soviet
government, but one against me by the GPU and its mentors. On
this subject I will only say, briefly: the trial which is beginning
today in Moscow is not a new trial, but a new and corrected
version of the January 1 935 trial [on the Kirov assassination].
Then too, my name was brought up, though indirectly. The
provocative role of the Latvian consul, a direct agent of the GPU,
who had allegedly financed the terrorist act and allegedly asked
the assassin for a letter to me, was exposed so clearly that this
part of the judicial amalgam was dropped completely and
a88 Writings of Leon Trotsky (1 935-36)
Medved, head of the Leningrad GPU , who had carried out the
task assigned to him so poorly, was sentenced to three years in
prison. After that, it took the GPU almost two years to correct the
errors which had been committed, to find new "witnesses , " to
forge new letters, and to extort new "confessions" from those who
had already been sentenced. This work seems to have reached a
point today where it can be presented publicly. It is possible that
the new presentation will be superficially more impressive than
the first. The great efforts of the bureaucracy are explained by its
discontent with my literary activity, which finds a response
among the Russian population, as one can see from reading the
Soviet newspapers. But no politically advanced person can take
seriously the idea that I am organizing terrorist acts against
Soviet leaders or that I collaborate with the Gestapo .
To summarize, I wish t o draw the following conclusion: the
allegations of a section of the Norwegian press that I collaborat
ed on the agrarian program of the NAP, participated in meetings
of the NAP, etc., do not need to be refuted. The minister of justice
has stated publicly that the views of Trotsky are not those of the
Norwegian Labor Party. I can only associate myself with this
statement and consider the accusation to be dealt with on this
point, in all of its absurdity. As for the rest of the allegations, I
am accused, on the one hand, of directing the revolutionary
movement in France, Spain, Belgium, Greece, etc., together with
Stalin , and, on the other, of working with the Gestapo to organize
terrorist acts against the Soviet leaders. Certain newspapers are
even able to make both accusations simultaneously on the same
page. But each cancels the other. They are both false and I find it
necessary to use strong terms: they are deceitfully fabricated.
Yours,
Leon Trotsky
WORSE THAN DREYFUS
AND RE ICHSTAG CAS E S 3 88
August 19, 1936
. . . For political vengeance the trial puts the Dreyfus scandal

and the Reichstag fire trial in the shadow.
The trial is all fraudulent. The confessions were forced by the
GPU, which gives the accused a choice between confessing
according to the GPU's desires and taking lesser penalties, or
death.
If I were in Russia I could easily disprove the accusations. But I
have copies of every letter I sent in the past s even years, and
granted time I shall prove that provocateurs have been active in
the Moscow trial for political revenge.
I will make the accusers the accused.
389
WHO I S V. OLBERG?389
August 2 0 , 1 9 3 6
According t o the indictment, V . Olberg declared that he entered

the Soviet Union under Trotsky's instructions for the purpose of
committing counterrevolutionary activity and especially the
assassination of Stalin. A person who undertakes such an
extraordinary mission must be not only well known to Trotsky
but also the recipient of his greatest confidence (accepting for the
moment the hypothesis that Trotsky is looking for people to
commit terrorist acts). However, the testimony of Olberg himself
reveals that Olberg never met Trotsky! And not because he did
not wish it.
By happy accident, I found today among a file of my oId papers
two letters concerning V. Olberg; and they revived an episode
which was absolutely insignificant at the time, but which today
is of the greatest political importance.
In the beginning of 1930, I was looking for a secretary who
understood Russian. My German friends, Franz Pfemfert (a well
known radical editor) and his wife (the translator of my
autobiography), received a proposal from a Lettish citizen, V.
Olberg, to come to Prinkipo as my secretary.390 The Pfemferts
invited Olberg to their home in order to find out what kind of a
person he was. On April 1 , 1930, Franz Pfemfert wrote to me:
"Olberg produces the most unfavorable and the most untrust
worthy impression. " The letter explains that Olberg, a former
Stalinist, had pretended overnight to have changed his ideas in
favor of the Opposition, and had immediately asked certain very
indiscrete questions about the Russian Opposition, Trotsky, the
conditions of his life, etc. "We must not underestimate the Stalin
clique, " continued Pfemfert. "They will stop at nothing in order to
penetrate our ranks with spies . . . . It is possible that Olberg is
merely a journalist and not yet a direct agent of Stalin. But he is
. . . a hysterical, arrogant, and tactless type . . . . Your home is
no place for Olberg, because he will become in twenty-four hours
390
Who Is V. Olberg? 391
an insufferable burden for you. Possibly-no, surely even for the

future. He will use his visit to you for his 'writings' -if not for
reports to the GPU."
A letter from Mrs. Pfemfert of April 2, 1930, said: "When we
heard that there was a possibility of Olberg visiting you, we were
horror-struck." This letter characterizes Olberg as a degenerate
and corrupt type .
After such "recommendations , " there w a s no longer any
question of engaging Olberg as my secretary. He disappeared
totally from my notice. Now this man claims-or more accurate
ly, his instructors make him claim-that he was sent by me to the
Soviet Union in order to assassinate Stalin.
I repeat-I never met Olberg and he, himself, does not dare to
affirm the contrary. The only thing I know about him is from the
two above-quoted letters from friends who have my full confi
dence. The fact that the GPU cannot find a better witness against
me throws a great light on the entire trial. I h ave no doubt that
the other witnesses are of the same character. I hope to have the
opportunity to prove this in the next day or so.
P.S.-Mr. Franz Pfemfert is now in exile in Carlsbad,

Czechoslovakia, working as a photographer. He will surely
confirm the above.
INDIVIDUAL TERROR
AND MASS TERROR3 9 1
Au gust 2 0 , 1 9 3 6
W e Russian Bolsheviks have been reproached a great deal for

our terror. It does not exactly seem timely to me to enter once
again into the details of this question. Suffice it to recall that the
phase of terror in the Russian revolution did not begin until after
the intervention of the E ntente powers , who with the aid of
money and arms organized insurrections against Soviet power,
just as Hitler and Mussolini prepared and support the rebellion of
Franco today. In this sense revolutionary "terror" is nothing but
the use of armed force against the armed force of the oppressors
and exploiters. Napoleon understood well after the experience of
the Great French Revolution that no large social upheaval can
come about without civil war and, as a consequence, mass terror.
But a revolution cannot be provoked at will. It breaks out-as
Engels once expressed it-like a natural cataclysm in human
history. And once you are in labor, you cannot argue about the
advantages or inconveniences of childbirth pains. A revolution
ary party seeks to alleviate the revolution's childbirth pains and
thus to reduce to a minimum its concomitant bloodletting. If there
had been a revolutionary party in Spain, the popular victory
would today be assured , and furthermore paid for with far
smaller sacrifices . In this historical sense one can no more rej ect
terror than reject history itself.
However, the word "terror" is often used to designate attempt
ed individual political assassinations, which is something
altogether different. In the history of Russia individual terror
played a significant role as the political instrument of the n arrow
layer of intelligentsia in its struggle against czarism. The
Marxist tendency grew up in permanent head-on conflict with the
individual terrorist method. The Marxists-not by chance
sought to lean on social evolution, that is, on the movement
coming into being, whereas the intellectuals, isolated from the
392
Indi vidual Terror and Mass Terror 393
masses, tried to provoke "their" revolution artificially, and on

their own authority, with bombs.
I grew from political immaturity in an atmosphere of struggle
against adventurist and terrorist illusions . During the years from
1 897 to 1 908 I published numerous articles and made many
speeches against individual terrorism and for the struggle of the
revolutionary class . In 1 9 1 1 , when terrorist tendencies arose
among the Viennese proletariat, Friedrich Adler, the present
secretary of the Second International, asked me to write an
article on terrorism, which appeared in Der Kampf, published by
Adler, in N ovember 1 9 1 1 . 3 9 2 This article, which to this day I
cons i der quite correct, counterposes the organized class struggle
to terrorist adventurism. The principal argument is summarized
as follows : Individual terrorism is particularly inadmissible in
our v iew because it reduces the masses' importance in their own
consciousness, because it reconciles them to powerlessness and
orients their attention and hope toward a great avenger and
liberator.
As the iron y of history would have it, Friedrich Adler, who in
1 9 1 1 declared himself in full agreement with my article, five
years later, during the war, committed a terrorist act against
Austrian Prime Minister Stuergkh.:l93 Even though all my
sympathies were with Friedrich Adler, I counterposed to his
individualist act, which was above all an act of despair, the
method of Liebknecht, who, during the war, went to a public
square in Berlin to distribute an appeal against the war. Our
method is Liebknecht's and not Friedrich Adler's.
By the same token I do not see the slightest reason to alter this
position on individual terrorism today. If in the struggle against
czarism we criticized the assassination of this or that minister or
general, or even of the czar himself (and certainly not out of
sympathy for them) in favor of mass insurrection against
czarism, then no serious person will believe that today we could
recommend or use that method against the Soviet bureaucracy.
The Soviet bureaucracy, which could also be called the Soviet
aristocracy, has certainly become the greatest social danger to
the country's development. But it can only be replaced by the
conscious vanguard of the working class in a mass political
struggle in the country. Kirov, who fell victim to assassination by
the young bureaucrat Nikolaev, was immediately replaced by
another bureaucrat, Zhdanov. There are hundreds and thousands
of aspirants , always ready to step into the breach.
The press of Moscow speaks in every case of the alleged
preparation of an attempt against Stalin. But Stalin himself is

only a primus inter pares (first among equals). The gentlemen in
charge think of themselves as the creators of History and as the
irreplaceable benefactors of Humanity. In reality Stalin is only
the representative of the ruling caste. Its strength makes him
strong; its intelligence makes him intelligent (or rather, its
cunning makes him cunning). The elimination of Stalin would
not change much. Molotov, or someone else, would fulfill the
same function with just about the same success if the masses
remained p assive and dispersed.
The isolated bureaucrat fears terrorism. The bureaucracy a s a
caste exploits to its advantage every terrorist act. We see this in
the most clear and shocking manner in the USSR itself. The
ruling clique, since the assassination of Kirov, has shot hundreds
of people and has sent tens of thousands to prison, exile, or
concentration camps. The struggle against terrorism serves the
bureaucracy as a pretext for strangling the s lightest movement
toward opposition, all critical thought in the country and in
particular within the ruling party itself. Under these conditions
the use of terrorism by anyone would signify the most glaring
form of political and physical suicide. If those in power in
Moscow attribute such methods to me it only proves how low the
political level has fallen in the Soviet Union. The unheard-of
grossness of this falsification is in the first place a reflection on
the ruling l ayer itself. This is why it is especially significant to
see the tenacity with which the bureaucracy revives the Kirov
assassination. This fact proves, on the one hand, that attempted
assassinations, at least against the highest-level figures, are only
rare exceptions; but on the other hand it proves that the
bureaucracy needs these attempts to justify and reinforce its own
authority. This need explains the strange fact that after an
interval of a year and a half, the same trial has been launched
once again in an expanded "edition," which, for example, even
Hitler did not dare to do with the Reichstag fire trial.
A REVOLUTIONARY,
NOT A TERRORIST3 9 4
August 2 1 , 1936
It has now become a matter of the lives of many people living

in the USSR and of my honor as a man who takes part in
political affairs. I hold my own opinions and I have always
defended them. I am still of the same opinions as previously. I am
a revolutionary, not a terrorist. When Friedrich Adler assassinat
ed Austrian Prime Minister Stuergkh in 1916, I declared that my
policy was not that of Adler, but that of Karl Leibknecht. Karl
Liebknecht went into the Berlin streets to distribute leaflets
against the war.
Had I wished to hide my opinions I need never have gone into
exile for the third time. But I am a revolutionary. If I could go to
Spain today, I would do so. I would fight for the revolution
against the fascist rebels-I say this openly and frankly-but I
cannot go to Spain and it is absurd to say now that I am taking
part in something that is going on there.
In what follows, chronology plays an important role. This is
why I ask you to pay particular attention to the development of
the events. The GPU has a great deal of talent, but it does not
know the art of s cientific chronology. I arrived in Turkey in
February 1929, after my expulsion from the USSR. By March 4 , I
had written the following in the Russian review Biulleten
Oppozitsii, which appeared in July 1 929 in Paris: "There remains
only one thing for Stalin: to try to draw a line of blood between
the official party and the Opposition. He a bsolutedly must
connect the Opposition with terrorist crimes, preparation of
armed insurrection, etc. But precisely that road has been blocked
by the leadership of the Opposition . . . . Hence Stalin's plan . . .
to exile the Opposition [leadership]" (at this time the expulsion of
a number of people was being prepared) "and thereby free his
own hands for criminal work against the young rank-and-file
Oppositionists whose names are not yet known to the masses,
395
especially abroad. . That is why after the exile of the leaders

of the Opposition we must expect with certainty an attempt by
the Stalin clique in one way or another to provoke one or another
so-called oppositional group to an adventure, and in case of
failure-to fabricate and plant on the Opposition a 'terrorist act'
or a 'military plot' ' ' ["What Is the Immediate Aim of Exiling
Trotsky?" in Writings 29].
Every individual, no matter which party he belongs to, will
recognize the great importance of this quotation. If you can read
Russian, you can see from the Biulleten-in which all my articles
have been published for seven and a half years-that I have
always been an opponent of individual terror, and that even at
that time I warned of what would be coming.
The first attack that came was the assassination of Kirov, in
December 1934. Kirov was an administrator of average ability; in
my view, of no political importance. After the assassination the
government gave two explanations. First they said that the
assassination was the work of White terrorists from Poland,
Rumania, and other countries around the Soviet borders.
Suddenly, on December 1 7 , it was announced that the assassin,
Nikolaev, was a member of the Leningrad Opposition. Perhaps
Nikolaev really was a member of the Leningrad Opposition, but
that was in 1 926 and not in 1934. The chapter of the Leningrad
Opposition was closed in 1 926.
Two weeks later Zinoviev was drawn into the affair and
accused, along with his partisans, of being an assassin. In 1 926
Zinoviev collaborated with me within the framework of the party
and was considered an Oppositionist. When, in 1928, the
bureaucracy became stronger, Zinoviev capitulated. From 1 929 to
1934 Zinoviev and Kamenev were considered to be traitors to the
Opposition-the Biulleten Oppozitsii p ointed this out with all the
necessary clarity.
When I learned that these two had been linked up with the
attack, I said that something extraordinary had happened. I had
no knowledge that they had once more rej oined the Opposition. I
did not doubt for a moment that they had nothing to do with the
assassination. These two were brought before a tribunal in
January 1 935 and up until then my name had not been
mentioned in connection with the affair. This was only done in
the charges.
Look. These are my own books. Some of them are slightly
scorched. This was due to the fire we had in Constantinople.
These books are the result of forty years of literary activity, and
A Revolutionary, Not a Terroris t 397
in all of them you will notice that I have been an opponent of

individual terror-in the Soviet Union as well as in the rest of the
world.
In 1935 I was not accused, but only mentioned. It was said that
Nikolaev had declared that before the attack he had had relations
with the consul of a foreign country. He had received 5000 rubles
from this consul to make the attempt. In exchange Nikolaev had
to render a service to the consul: procure him a letter from
Trotsky.
Gentlemen, this was all that was said about me in the charges.
But the judge neglected to question Nikolaev about this letter!
When the consul was drawn into the affair, all the other
consuls protested and demanded the publication of the name of
this shameful colleague. Following this, it was learned after a
long delay that the name was Skujeneck and that he was from
Latvia.395 A demand was made that the Soviet government
address a diplomatic note to Latvia, but the reply was: "No, the
consul has fled s afe and sound to Finland. " Certainly he had not
acted at that time as a consul but as a private individual. I
demanded many times: "Why was he not brought forward? Why
was he not placed before a tribunal? Is it not because he is a GPU
agent?"
In my opinion the attack on Kirov was arranged in ord er to
crush the Opposition-however, there had been no intention of
killing Kirov; the attack was to have been prevented at the last
moment. When the matter took the wrong turn the GPU chief in
Leningrad, Medved, was called to account. This was the third
trial in connection with the attack!
Medved and several other GPU functionaries were accused of
knowing of the attack, but of h aving done nothing to prevent it.
Medved confessed and was sentenced to three years in prison.
I know Medved. He is not a man of independent politics-it was
Stalin himself who directed this affair in order to strike at the
Opposition. I do not know today whether Nikolaev himself was a
GPU agent. The fact that he succeeded in getting into Kirov's
office-Kirov had lofty functions and by no means everybody had
access to him-is an indication that seems to prove it. Medved, in
any case, found Nikolaev through the intermediary of his GPU
agents . Nikolaev was a desperate young bure ucrat. What
psychological factors drove him to murder I do not know.
But the persecution of the Oppositionists began. I was not on
the wrong track when I foresaw that events would take this turn.
The trial now being held is a new edition of the January 1 935
trial. At that time we had a general rehearsal. Now we have the

premiere.
This affair has been in preparation for the last year and a half.
I am now not only the organizer of the attack, but I am also
linked with the Gestapo, gentlemen. And my name was
mentioned only in passing in the 1 935 charges.
I am linked up with the Gestapo? And with so powerful an ally
I could achieve only the assassination of Kirov?
New witnesses are b eing brought into the trial today. I have
heard a large number of the names for the first time now. I do not
know thes e people. And no more talk is heard of the consul who
disappeared. These witn esses were obtained during the year and
a half that has j ust passed. If I were in the USSR today, I would
be lost. I am, however, abroad, and I will call hundreds of
witnesses who will prove that I had nothing to do with the Kirov
assassination.
Q: It is claimed that you met Berman-Yurin at a rendezvous in

Copenhagen and Oslo, on the subj ect of the Kirov assassina
tion.396
A: From Constantinople I visited Copenhagen to give an

address to a student organization. During my stay in Copenha
gen, some forty or so persons visited me. I remember them all,
but there was no Berman among them-if he has not changed his
name since then-nor was there any other Soviet citizen. There
was a Russian-speaking Lithuanian with whom I talked.
Among my papers I have found the following facts, which
throw some light. In 1 930, a certain Olberg tried to become my
secretary. Franz Pfemfert, at that time editor of Die Aktion,
warned me by a letter dated April 1, 1930, in the most resolute
fashion, that Olberg was a suspicious character and prob ably a
GPU agent. When Olberg seemed to be the b asis of the whole
accusation, I volunteered the material characterizing him to the
press [see "Who is V. Olberg?"]. It is simply absurd to state that I
have given terrorist missions to a man whom I do not know and
against whom a good friend warned me.
During my stay in Norway I have not received any visitors
from the USSR. Nor have I written to the USSR, directly or
indirectly. Until two years ago my wife was in contact with our
son. At that time he was a teacher in the Higher Technical
School. I do not know where he is today. By accident we learned
that he has been exiled to Siberia. He has never occupied himself
A Revolutionary, Not a Terrorist 399
with politics, but it is enough that he is a son of Trotsky. The

letters we received from him up until twenty months ago
consisted only of short greetings, like my wife's letters to him.
She also has endeavored to learn where he is through an Oslo
bank, but the Soviet authorities simply reply: " address un
known . "
Our other son, o n the other hand, h a s participated i n political
life. In 1 928 he followed us to Asia of his own free will and then
came on to Turkey. He has just finished his studies in the
Sorbonne.
In a dispatch sent out by Moscow on the subject of the trial, a
letter is cited which I sent to Smirnov through my son.397 In this
letter I asked for three things: (1) that Stalin and Voroshilov be
killed; (2) that cells be organized in the army; and (3) that in case
of war all shortcomings be taken advantage of in order to seize
power. The whole letter comprises five lines! Five lines for these
three tasks . That is a little too concise.
This is all gross falsification, a lie; it is an infamous lie which
is aimed against me. But in the USSR there is no opportunity to
raise a critical voice. Criticism is muffled there and absurd
accusations are uncontested for the moment. Here there is an
opportunity to criticize, and, gentlemen, I criticize!
A MINIATURE E DITION OF
THE M O SCOW INDICTMENT39 8
August 2 1 , 1 9 3 6
T o t h e editors o f A rbeiderbladet
L 'Humanite, the Paris organ which represents Stalin's policies ,

rep orts in its August 1 9 number the Norwegia n govern ment's
Trotsky investigation under the incredible titl e: "A meeti n g
between fascist agents and Trots ky . " Literally, t h e note s a y s t h e
following: " T h e i n vestigation will focus around a supposed visit
to Trotsky's resi d e n ce by m e m b ers of a fascist organization . "
T h erefore-accord ing to th e Sta linist press-my in terference i n
Norwegian matters con sists in m aintaining a ctive political
connecti ons with fascists. The F rench Stalinists are not in power.
Therefore they cannot stage a trial against m e . However, th e
method is the s a m e : The short n ote in l 'Humanite is only a
miniature edition of the Moscow indictment.
Leon Trotsky
400
A REVEALING E PISODE399
August 22, 1936
To the editors of the Copenhagen Social-Demokraten
Dear Editors:
In the August 20 Oslo Dagbladet, I find an excrpt from one of
your articles on the Moscow trials which concerns the speech I
delivered during my brief sojourn in Copenhagen [November
1932l I attribute the greatest importance to this article, or at least
to the part which I have chanced to come upon_ When I learned
through the Norwegian newspapers about the first Tass report on
the Moscow indictments , I said something to the following effect
in the midst of the family of the editor Knudsen (Norwegian
Labor Party):
Berman-Yurin, who seems to be one of the principal witnesses
against me, is entirely unknown to me. He is probably one of the
GPU's agents provocateurs . However, the man made an extreme
ly poor selection in the time and place of his alleged contact with
me. For I happened to be in Copenhagen in the house of my
friend Boeggild, who has since died, when I heard a report that
Zinoviev had died, which, however, later proved to be false. 40o At
that time, in the presence of several friends, I immediately gave a
short character sketch of Zinoviev, in which I pointed out that
from 1923 to 1926 he sharply opposed me and my friends, from
1926 to 1928 he drew closer to our position, and from 1928 until
his (ostensible) death he once again became our enemy. I said
that, nevertheless, we were the only ones qualified to defend his
memory against the slan ders of the Stalinist press. That same
day or the day after I repeated these very same thoughts in the
midst of a larger circle of friends.
Although your contributor had only second-hand knowledge of
the whole affair, namely from the late Boeggild, he repeats it with
outstanding accuracy. The conclusion drawn from this episode by
the author of the article, who is unknown to me, destroys the
40 1
testimony of Berman-Yurin. In November 1932, I could not trust

even a living Zinoviev with a confidential political mission, since
I considered him a political opponent, and still less a Zinoviev
who, at the very time of my brief visit to Copenhagen, I thought
had just died. One can also add that all of my friends who were
present at the two short eulogies I gave for Zinoviev are still
living-with the exception of Boeggild-and are all certainly
prepared to give their testimony.
I can only assure your readers and public opinion in general
that all the rest of the testimony and confessions are in no case
based on a more solid foundation.
I hope to establish this in the near future on the basis of the
documents and with the aid of voluntary-not extorted
testimony, thus tearing the despicable amalgam of the GPU to
shreds, down to the last detail.
Thanking you in advance for the publication of this letter, I
am, very respectfully,
Yours,
Leon Trotsky
S TATEMENT ON THE TRIAL 4 0 1
August 23, 1936
The Confessions
The "confessions" made by Zinoviev, Kamenev, etc.

politicians known to the whole world-by virtue of their content
and tone are a crude confirmation of my first statement of August
19 to the effect that the accused will be the real accusers . During
the first j udicial proceeding, on January 15, 1935, Zinoviev and
Kamenev were accused of being morally responsible for Kirov's
murder, and at the time they stated only that they were morally
responsible f or Kirov's murder. Now they are accused of having
directly organized that same terrorist act and of having prepared
still others; and with the same forced goodwill, they declare this
to be so. But neither one of them has said a single word about
whether he had any concrete relations whatsoever with the
assassin Nikolaev, and if so, in what manner, with which
intermediaries, in what place, at what time and with whom the
meetings took place, etc. For his part, the prosecutor has carefully
avoided inconveniencing the defendants and witnesses by such
questions.
The statements of Zinoviev, Kamenev, and others resemble the
lead articles in Pravda and Izves tia, whose chief editors,
incidentally, are accused of complicity in terrorist acts (Bukharin,
Radek).402 One may easily appreciate the convenience of these
self-accusations, consciously false, which fundamentally repre
sent accusations against someone else, namely, the undersigned.
Nevertheless, one must not lose sight of the fact that these
confessions-which are 100 percent form, without any concrete
content-in the mouths of these unfortunate defendants are a
way of telling the public: All is lies and falsifications.
The Circumstances of My Stay in Copenhagen
Besides B erman-Yurin, who is unknown to me, Fritz David,

whom I do not know either, claims to h ave received orders from
me from Copenhagen with a view toward terrorist acts.411:1 The
403
statements of these witnesses prove that they do not have the

faintest idea about my stay in Copenhagen. I came straight from
Prinkipo to Copenhagen with four young friends. Since this was
my first trip to Western Europe in sixteen years, some friends
from Germany , Holland, Belgium, France , Norway, and other
countries came immediately; no fewer than thirty to forty
persons , not counting, on the one hand, my Danish hosts, and on
the other hand many journalists, photographers, film-makers,
etc. The young people, rightly or wrongly, had fears for my
safety. Anyone who wanted to get to my office had to go through
another room where there were always four, five , six, or more
friends. Therefore, it is out of the question that anyone might
have seen me without being known to several friends who are
now living in Western Europe . Thus any regular tribunal would
have a perfect opportunity to verify by means of their testimony
the assertions of the two GPU agents who supposedly received
terrorist orders from me in Copenhagen, and to become convinced
of the complete absurdity of these assertions .
My Son Leon Sedov
All of the terrorists supposedly sent abroad by me make

references to my son Leon Sedov, at the time a student in Berlin,
now living in Paris, where he has just taken his examinations at
the Sorbonne. What emerges clearly from these statements,
carefully screened by the Tass agency, is that the " terrorists" are
supposed to have been selected by my son and that only two of
them were put in contact with me in Copenhagen. It would follow
from this that I supposedly transmitted incitements to terrorist
acts to persons I did not know, through a young student who
acted as intermediary, which in itself is an absurdity. I can only
explain the need to resort to such nonsense by the fact that the
GPU agents provocateurs would naturally have had greater
opportunity to approach a student at the University of Berlin or
Paris, to speak to him, or at le ast to watch him, than would have
been the case with me. They furthermore are attempting, in
passing, to compromise the young man in the eyes of the French
authorities . Anyone capable of thinking politically will reach his
own judgment in the matter.
The Gestapo
The charges relative to my supposed relationship with the

Statement on the Trial 405
Gestapo are so stupid and vulgar, in all their impudence, that

they do not need to be refuted.
An Independent Trial Procedure
These notes have only a hasty character. I am now in the

process of studying all the material, in p amphlet form, from the
legal and political point of view. In the meantime I am ready to
reply to any questions which the world press might wish to ask.
In my opinion , it would be best if the proposal made by the
conservative newspaper Morgenbladet in its August 21 edition
could be carried out as soon as possible-to have the Soviet
authorities' charges against me examined by an independent
Norwegian tribunal. I am willing, naturally, to appear before a
Danish tribunal to account for my activities on Danish soil. A
free and open proceeding would be of historic importance, not for
me personally but for the trial.
TOM SKY'S S UICIDE404
August 23, 1936
Tomsky's suicide seems to be a logical link in the chain of the

Moscow trial. Tomsky was one of the strongest personalities in
the Soviet Union, the greatest figure the Russian proletariat has
produced from its own ranks in thirty years. In Lenin's day he
was a member of the Political Bureau and later he was secretary
of the powerful all-Russian trade union federation. In the last
years of disgrace and persecution he was still the head of the
state publishing house.
Yesterday's news reads that Bukharin and Rykov, with whom
Tomsky had formed a political alliance, were summoned for an
examination by the head of the GPU, Yagoda. The result is said
to be unsatisfactory. That means that on the basis of the
"revelations," Yagoda requested the leaders of the former Right
Opposition to confess their alleged terrorist connections. Tomsky
is a totally different type of man from Zinoviev and Kamenev; he
has a strong will, self-respect, and pride. He has answered
Yagoda's demand to participate in an outrageous political
falsification with suicide, and this suicide is irrefutable evidence
of the falseness of the indictment and the whole trial.
It must be remembered that the Political Bureau of the
Bolshevik Party had the following composition: Lenin, Trotsky,
Zinoviev, Kamenev, Rykov, Tomsky, and Stalin. Lenin has died.
Among the others, five have been indicted as terrorists and
conspirators against the Soviet state they built. The political
objective of this trial is the complete extermination of the old
Bolshevik Party, its traditions, and its program. Tomsky's suicide
closes one whole historical epoch and opens a new one.
406
SO M E FACTS
FO R THE PRAGUE CO MMITTEE 4 0 5
August 23, 1936
1 . I was deprived of my citizenship on February 20, 1 932, by a

ruling of the Central Executive Committee of the USSR. I
answered it with my "Open Letter to the CEe Presidium. " This
letter (dated March 1, 1932) was published for the first time in
Russian in the Biulleten Oppozitsii, in March 1 932 in Berlin. This
"Open Letter" says: "It is time to carry out Lenin's final and
insistent advice: remove Stalin" [see "On Being Deprived of
Soviet Citizenship" in Writings 32].
This letter-which, at the time, was published in all the
languages of the civilized world-was viewed during the [present]
trial as a "secret document" and was interpreted as a directive to
assassinate Stalin. This sounds incredible, but it is true!
2. I personally knew all of the sixteen executed, except for
Olberg, Berman-Yurin, Fritz D avid, M. Lurie, and N. Lurie. 4 06
Like a lot of young and old Marxists who were unknown to me,
and even non-Marxists from every continent, Olberg wrote to me
from Berlin in 1 930 (from January until July). I always answer
all the letters that are sent to me, even the insignificant ones. (I
only make an exception of the lunatics, the autograph collectors,
and all the pious people who are worried about my soul.)
I have now found all the letters Olberg sent me, as well as the
copies of my answers . They deal almost exclusively with the
German Communist Party, the Hitlerite danger, the Left
Opposition, etc. (This correspondence can be submitted in full to
any court at any time.)407
The originals of Mr. Pfemfert and his wife's kind letters (April 1
and 2, 1 930) are at my home.
Since that time, I had forgotten all about Olberg, even his
name. It was only during the Moscow trial that a young friend of
mine, while sorting my oId papers, let me know that he had
noticed this name. In this way, I came across the above
mentioned letters.
407
I never knew anything about Berman- Yurin, David, or the two

Luries before the trial, much less ever met them. As for the so
called Copenhagen visits, it will be essential to write about that
again in detai l, because the whole Copenhagen episode (the most
important one!) was a very unfortunate idea for the GPU forgers:
every single detail can be refuted.
As far as Dreitser is concerned, his name did not mean
anything to me, at first.408 But my wife remembered that, indeed,
an officer by that name was among the officers who , after my
departure from the Kremlin in 1927, spontaneously guarded my
private apartm ent for a few weeks. In 1928 Dreitser "capitulated"
with a very hostile stab at me. Ever since, he completely
disappeared from my horizon and even from my memory. I never
wrote to him from abroad , not one line, and I had no relations
with him at all .
3. It goes without saying that my son would be ready to appear
before a court as a witness. His potential testimony is of the
utmost importance. It is enough to say that my son has never
been to Copenhagen. It can be irrefutably proven that in
November 1932, while my wife and I were in Copenhagen (we
were there for nine days!), he was in Berlin.
4. Among the executed I knew the following ones well, or pretty
well : Zinoviev , Kamenev, Yevdokimov, Bakaev (all " Zinoviev
ists"), Smirnov, Ter-Vaganian, Mrachkovsky (former "Trotsky
ists" who capitulated as early as 1928-29 and publicly took
positions against me):I09
5. Reingold (a " Zinovievist") was less well known to me. Pikel
and Goltsman, I have seen a few times.41o Pikel was a
"Zinovievist" for a while. Nobody trusted him . I did not have any
relations with him . Goltsman did not belong to the Opposition at
all. If I remember correctly, he "sympathized" with it, as did
many petty and middle-level state functionaries of those years. I
saw him two or three times in my life. It is possible and even
probable that in January 1928 he came to our home, as did
hundreds of other "liberal" Soviet functionaries, to take leave of
my wife and me before our deportation to Central Asia.
Since then, in any case, I have never seen him, nor have I
corresponded with him. I cannot say anything about his stay in
Berlin .
During those years ( 1930-33)-years of the " collectivization"
there were plenty of dissatisfied Soviet functionaries who while
they were abroad gave free expression to their critical opinions
at least between the four walls of a room. My cothinkers in
Some Facts for the Prague Committee 409
diverse European countries used to assemble such "critical

depositions" and put them at my disposal. I made articles from
this material for the Russian Biulieten, etc. My son sent me such
communications several times during his stay in Berlin : all of
them will be found in the Russian Biulleten. They are of the
utmost interest if one wants to know my political state of mind ,
as well as that of m y s o n a n d of his incidental visitors from the
USSR. Did my son mention Goltsman's name at the time? I do
not remember, nor does my wife. It is possible that my son did not
mention his source in that case, as in others, since my
correspondence is never secure and "critical" people from the
USSR risk a lot. Anyway, the name would not have meant much
to me.
6. I remember rather well that my son met Smirnov once in a
Berlin street in a manner totally unexpected for both of them .
Smirnov was quite close to me until 1929, closer than any of the
other accused. He was honest, sincere, devoted to our ideas, but
not independent and a little frivolous. He needed someone to rely
upon. After my expulsion he made his mea culpa (vigorously
against me) and I declared him in the press to be politically dead.
During the collectivization years he seemed, like many others, to
have again come into a semi-oppositional state of mind. It was in
that state of mind that he ran into my son. He told him various
things about friends in the Opposition, about the tendencies in
the USSR, about the contradictions in the bureaucracy and other
things. (Details of all this can be found in the Russian Biulleten.)
It is the clumsiest absurdity to think that my son, who was
twenty-four at the time, could have given "terrorist directives" to
this broken old man .
STALIN IS NOT EVE RYTHIN G4 11
August 23 , 1936
I was already rej oicing to be able to quietly continue my work

on Lenin's biography. Now I have to spend time on the most
disgusting slanders and false accusations. There is nothing to be
done about it. The old Wilhelm Liebknecht used to say: "Whoever
has to deal with politics must have a thick skin."
One may rightly wonder, why did Stalin start this miserable
affair, which does damage to the whole working class movement?
For very different-and to some extent contradictory-reasons:
1 . To politically kill the Opposition he tried to use the Kirov
assassination. But he thought that case would be easier than it
actually was. As far as I am concerned, the business with the
Latvian consul was a pitiful fiasco. As for Zinoviev , Kamenev,
and the others, there is not one serious and honest person who
believed that they had any link whatsoever with the assassin.
Everyone-even in the Soviet Union-whispered that all this was
an infamous GPU plot. In order to back up the first trial, Stalin
had to start another one, this time better prepared.
2. The Comintern exists and, despite the turn toward oppor
tunism and chauvinism, in the eyes of bourgeois public opinion it
bears responsibility for the whole revolutionary movement. The
Fourth International has often been described as an offshoot of
the Third International. Stalin tried with all his might
remember his interview with Laval-to prove that the Comintern
was no longer a revolutionary instrument. But his word was not
always so easily believed. To strengthen his credit with the
French bourgeoisie he thought it useful to take bloody measures
against the Left Opposition.
3. But neither will he be able to renounce the Comintern. So
called "Trotskyism," i.e., the development and the continuity of
Marx and Lenin's ideas, is spreading more and more, even in the
ranks of the Comintern . Very important phenomena of this kind
have been noted in France, in Czechoslovakia, and in other
410
Stalin Is Not Everything 411
countries. That is why it is a matter ofAi fe and death for Stalin,

for his political authority before the rkers, to destroy "Trot
skyism . " With words? That is not his way . He has the apparatus,
which makes it possible for him to stage frame-up trials.. . .In
this way the accusation must strengthen Stalin's authority
simultaneously among the Allied bourgeoisie and among the
revolutionary workers.
This contradictory double game is a sign of the internal
inconsistency of the entire politics of Stalinism as a national
ruling caste, on the one hand, and as an international working
class organization (the Comintern) , on the other.
If one passes from the political aspect to the personal one, there
is another motive to be mentioned: that of desire for revenge,
which is very pronounced in Stalin.One evening in 1 924, Stalin,
Dzerzhinsky, and Kamenev were sitting around a bottle of wine (I
do not know if it was the first one) and chatting about this and
that, when they came to wonder during the conversation about
what each of them loved best in life . I do not recall the reply of
Dzerzhinsky or of Kamenev, from whom I got the story. But
Stalin said: "What is best in life is to choose your victim, prepare
your blow well, take pitiless revenge, and then to go to bed."
You may remember that in 1 9 2 1 Lenin had strongly advised
the party against electing Stalin to the post of general secretary.
"This cook"-Lenin literally said-"will prepare only spicy
dishes . " In any case, Lenin could not at that moment have had
the slightest idea o f just how spicy this cook's dishes would be.
You certainly have not forgotten that in his "testament" Lenin
advised the party to remove Stalin from the post of general
secretary because of his rudeness and disloyalty. This characteri
zation, set down in an official letter, did not give Lenin's full
thought. In the fall of 1926 Krupskaya told me, in the presence of
Zinoviev and Kamenev: "Volo dya (that is what she used to call
Vladimir Lenin) said of Stalin: 'He lacks the most elementary
sense of honor. ' ' ' And she repeated: "You understand? The most
elementary human decency!" So far, I have never published those
words because I did not want to bring grief to Krupskaya . But
now that she is moving hopelessly down official channels and
cannot raise the slightest protest against the infamous crimes of
the ruling clique, I consider it correct to give publicity to those
words of Lenin.
The defendants, who at the same time were used as witnesses
for the prosecution, have j ustified their so-called terrorist
intentions against Stalin by the fact that in the Soviet Union
everything depends on him. This conception suits the bureaucra

cy as well as the adventuristic terrorists . The almighty bureau
crat thinks: I am everything. The terrorists say of the almighty
bureaucrat: he is everything. I say it once again: the terrorist is
only the red shadow of bureaucratic absolutism. As for me, I am
far from believing that Stalin is everything. On this point I have
already said enough. Stalin's victory over the Opposition was a
social act, not a personal one. It means the victory of a new
ruling caste over the proletariat. Profound economic reasons in
the USSR and profound political reasons in Western Europe were
decisive in this victory. Stalin is only the head of a new ruling
caste. In his brutal and ignorant mediocrity he best expresses the
main features of the new parvenu ruling layer.
It would be pitiful stupidity to believe that with a gun or a
bomb it would be possible to stop or avoid the great social and
political reaction in the Soviet Union. The real way out can only
be opened to the Russian people by the world proletariat. If the
Spanish revolution is victorious today, if the French proletariat
truly reaches power, if a new wind blows across Europe, then the
Russian proletariat will begin to move and will become conscious
again of its own great tradition. And then the bureaucratic heroes
who think they are the center of the world will be swept into the
dustbin of history.
If those gentlemen in the Kremlin want to accuse me of serving,
with my writings, the future victory of the Soviet people over the
reactionary bureaucracy, I answer: "Yes, I admit to being guilty!"
INTERVIEW IN NEWS CHRONICLE 4 1 2
August 24, 1 9 3 6
Q : What is your reply t o the categorical accusations made

against yourself and your son at the Moscow trial?
A: My preliminary j udgment of the Moscow case has been

expressed in several declarations. The cas e is one of the biggest,
clumsiest, and most criminal plots of the secret police against
world opinion.
There are so many elements in the cas e-by the way, there
seem to be a series of new supplementary cases in preparation
that I think it certain that the criminal net will tear in several
places, thereby allowing the truth to escape sooner or later.
The suicides of Tomsky and Sokolnikov already provide two
tragic denials of the accusations.413
Q: Are you sure that Sokolnikov has committed suicide?
A: I hope not, but the report was broadcast in Norway .

The GPU gave these former opponents the choice either of
slandering themselves, thus committing political suicide, or of
being executed by the authorities; but they have preferred to reply
to the formidable blackmail of the police by killing themselves.
I consider it possible that letters from those driven to death will
yet reach the public .
Q: Do you suggest that the Soviet government has an ulterior

motive in holding this prosecution at this moment?
A: From a political point of view, the case has been directed

against all opposition in general, and against me personally, in
particular. It proves the colossal political tension in the country,
the discontent of the burea ucracy, and the antagonisms that exist
within the bureaucracy up to the highest spheres.
413
The case will inevitably be followed by important political

consequences which may develo p into open mass struggles and
violent repercussions.
Q: Do you think that the Soviet government considered it

necessary to carry out a purge before the introduction of the new
regime?
A: The capitalist press of the world doubts the sincerity of the

conservative and nationalist tendencies of the Soviet bureau
cracy.
The Stalin clique has tried by this case to prove that they have
broken finally and ruthlessly with the revolutionary traditions of
the Bolshevik Party.
But it should not be forgotten that the Politburo, which directed
the fate of the Russian revolution as well as of the Comintern
when Lenin was still alive, was composed as follows: Lenin,
Trotsky, Zinoviev, Kamenev, Tomsky, Rykov, Stalin, with
Bukharin as a can didate.
Lenin is dead. All the other members of the Politburo except
Stalin have now been charged as plotters against the Soviet
state, as terrorists, and even as allies of the German secret police!
Anybody who is able to think politically will not, of course, place
the slightest reliance on these accusations, but o n the contrary,
will recognize them as the unmistakable signs of the great
political change that has taken place in the country.
The new conservative leading stratum, the Soviet aristocracy
p ersonified by Stalin, is finally severing the umbilical cord that
connected it with the October Revolution.
Q: What is your frank opinion of the new constitution which is

to be established in the USSR?
A: The new constitution means the official destruction of

political activity by the people. All power is being concentrated in
the hands of the bureaucracy, which calls itself the party.
The people are being atomized politically and in return acquire
the right to reply "secretly" to the question, "For or against the
Leader?" from tim e to time. The answer that results has been
sufficiently demonstrated in Hitlerite Germany.
Q: I have seen your statement that your activities now are

confined solely to writing. Would it be right to assume that you
Interview in News Chronicle 415
still believe in the necessity for a worldwide rlsmg by the

proletariat? If so, can it be possible that you have abandoned
your share in the fight to bring this about?
A: Not by one hair's breadth have I altered my views on the

fate of the historical mission of the proletariat. On the contrary!
The most recent events in the Soviet Union, on the one hand, and
in France, Spain, and Belgium, on the other, increase my
conviction that only the social revolution can save humanity
from economic and cultural ruin.
Q: Is it not common knowledge that what is called a Trotsky

movement has widespread ramifications outside the USSR?
A: You are completely right in maintaining that a movement

relying on my ideas is pushing itself forward now in nearly every
country.
The ideas I am defending, however, are not really my ideas, but
those of Marx, E ngels, and Lenin.
I have made it my task to protect these ideas from complete
discredit by the Soviet bureaucracy and to analyze the newest
developments by the methods of Marx. The books and articles I
have written in this connection have appeared and still appear in
different countries and in different languages .
It is more than absurd to conclude from that fact that I am
inspiring or directing revolutionary events in Spain, Greece, or
other countries from Norway.
Q: What, briefly, is your opinion of the League of Nations?
A: The League of Nations does not need to be " discredited" by

Marxists any longer; it has itself done everything necessary to
that end.
Let those who dare not face brutal reality go on comforting
themselves in the future with the empty idea of the League.
These people will have to pay for these illusions with
tremendous sacrifices.
Q: What is your opinion of the attitude of the powers, including

Russia, to the civil war in Spain?
A: It is one of the biggest blots on the records of the so-called

democratic governments, and chiefly of the French, that
Mussolini and Hitler were allowed the opportunity to stage a

fascist counterrevolution , to support it militarily, and then to
wash their hands in the innocence of neutrality.
The attitude of the Soviet government is, as always, conserva
tive, nationalist, and narrow. They try to justify themselves by
saying "We won't pro voke war." Thus they allow E urope to
become fascist and then retire. In the end they will have war after
all, but they will have to face it under much more unfavorable
conditions.
Q: What in your view is the probable o utcome of the S panish

war?
A: In spite of the treason of the French and Soviet govern

ments, I still count on the victory of the Spanish people. From
that victory, I believe, a socialist Spain will emerge.
Q: As a now detached observer, do you not think that the

peaceful and comparatively comfortable life of the British
workman, even under capitalism, with the prospect of a steady
improvement of his lot by methods of democratic evolution, is
preferable to the alternative of becoming cannon fodder in the
interests of either a Communist or a fascist revolution?
A: The question whether one should prefer progressive reforms

and step-by-step improvements of the people's lot to revolution is,
in my opinion, purely a cademic and has no historic meaning at
all .
The people are not allowed to make their choice. What has
happened and is happening in Europe is no accident, but a result
of the fact that capitalism as an economic system is completely
outdated, and of the additional fact that the ruling class will not
consent to its abolition and thus has called into being revolution
ary and counterrevolutionary convulsions.
Humanitarian arguments will never succeed in overcoming
powerful social interests.
AN ANSWER
TO MR. SCHARFFE N BERG 4 1 4
August 24, 1936
Mr. Scharffenberg's suggestion that I appear at the Moscow

trial-which by the way has already come to a fatal end-to
reveal the truth in the same way Dimitrov did in the Reichstag
fire trial, seems to me more idealistic than realistic. Dimitrov did
not go to Germany in order to expose the lie. He was arrested in
Germany. Not Dimitrov but Torgler voluntarily put himself at the
disposal of the authorities. And everybody branded him a coward
even before he turned out to be a traitor. Dimitrov's courage was
impressive, but not his false testimony. Since he could contribute
very little to exposing the Nazi conspiracy while in prison,
considerably more was done from abroad: the accused were
backed by the Soviet government.
In the Moscow trial the Soviet government refused any
intervention of Socialist or trade union representatives. They had
to bring the matter to a conclusion as quickly and radically as
possible. My "appearance" in the courtroom-if that were
possible-would only mean under these conditions that I give
myself up, bound hand and foot, to the conspirators against
world public opinion.
What do my proofs against the outrageous Moscow amalgam
consist of ? They consist of the fact that my whole work, my
literary activity, my correspondence, and my personal connec
tions are clearly reflected in my archives; that every l awyer,
every psychologist, and every politically thinking person would
have to come to the inescapable conclusion-because of the
cohesion of my ideas , expressed in public as well as in private
that not only a connection with the Gestapo but any kind of
individual terrorism is incompatible with my nature. Hundreds of
old and young, Central and West European friends were in close
contact with me during this time. Many of them lived in my home
417
for weeks, months, or years. Their testimony would be of crucial

importance for unmasking the criminal amalgam.
Does Mr. Scharffenberg believe that I would have the
opportunity in Moscow to summon these witnesses and to present
my documents to the public eye? In their deal with the public
prosecutor, the hapless defendants had to commit themselves,
concerning their behavior in court, to give up all claim to a legal
adviser, since any even halfway independent defense attorney
would become an insurmountable calamity for the accusers as
well as the self-accusers.
How can one believe that under these conditions in Moscow I
could help to clarify these matters in the slightest? However, in
my opinion it is the duty of the ministries of j ustice of those
countries from where I supposedly instigated the crimes to
summon me before the courts. I ask nothing else. The Soviet
government has all the means to convict me of a crime-if it does
not fear the light of public o pinion.
Mr. Scharffenberg thinks that honor is more important than
life. It was never necessary for anyone to remind me of that. The
political honor of those affected-including mine, insofar as
anyone considers me to be affected-can only be saved by the
truth. But now, as every politically thinking p erson will admit, it
is totally out of the question to help the truth win in Moscow.
Those concerned about the truth may help me to unmask the real
character of the Moscow amalgam right down to the bottom. Not
for my sake, but for the sake of the truth!
THE D E ATH S ENTENCE S415
August 24, 1936
The death sentences were inevitable. The second Kirov trial

involving Zinoviev and the others was arranged because no
politically thinking person believed in the authenticity of the
accusations in the first trial in January 1935. Furthermore, the
seriousness of the accusations against me can only be demon
strated to the world in this manner. By foregoing defense
attorneys the accused themselves acknowledged that the procla
mation of the death sentences was unavoidable.
There is a contradiction here, in that the so-called confessions
were extorted from the accused with the promise that their lives
would be spared. The government will certainly not feel impeded
by this contradiction. No one can verify whether the GPU's
obscure spies, Berman-Yurin, Olberg, David, and their cohorts,
were really shot or whether they continue their profession under
other names.
No one knows even now whether the fourteen who were
condemned to death along with the assassin Nikolaev were really
all shot, for as the subsequent trial of the Leningrad police chief
Medved demonstrated, among them were probably a significant
number of provocateurs. Perhaps they shot the provocateurs to
rid themselves of embarrassing accomplices.
But I think that by far the most important question from a
political point of view is that of the fate of Zinoviev, Kamenev,
and the other Old Bolsheviks . In their case, the government will
hardly consider itself bound by the GPU's promises. At least they
will not be guided by these alone. In the well-known Menshevik
trial a few years a go , the renowned author Zukhanov and the
scientist Gromann recited confessions dictated to them by the
GPU in return for the promise that they would be freed after a
short term of conventional imprisonment.41 6 But both of them
were sentenced to long prison terms on the basis of their own
false admissions. They demanded to be released. Zukhanov
4 19
resorted to a hunger strike and now no one knows what has

become of either of them.
There are only two things the government can do with
Zinoviev , Kamenev, and the others: either really shoot them,
thereby furnishing proof for the authenticity of the accusations
they directed against themselves, or else commute their sentences
to life imprisonment and later release them. In m aking its
decision the government will certainly take into account what
sort of impression the trial and the verdict are making around the
world.
The suicides of Tomsky and Sokolnikov, demonstrating that
they did not wish to defame themselves or drag themselves
through the mud, must certainly have had a deep effect in the
Soviet Union, even in the ruling circles, and will thus be an
important factor in the final decision reached by the government.
By the time these lines are published, the differences of opinion
among the ruling heads, which are unavoidable in such a
situation, may have already been resolved and the balance sheet
of this elaborate j uridical amalgam drawn.
REGULAR TRIAL DEMANDED417
August 25, 1936
All sixteen who were condemned in the Moscow trial have been
executed. There was nothing else for their accusers to do. If their
lives had been spared, one or another of them could have torn to
pieces the whole fabric woven by the GPU. Now both the self
accused and the agents have been silenced forever. The
undersigned, whom they attempted to single out as the leader, is,
however, alive. I h ave a right to a trial. According to the
prosecution, my terrorist activities were directed in p articular
from Denmark, France, and Norway. The crimes I am accused of
are punishable in these countries. Therefore I have a right to a
trial. It is also my duty to unmask one of the greatest crimes in
history and thereby to avenge it.
421
A LETTER TO TRYGVE LIE418
August 26, 1936
Sir:
I have always endeavored to comply with the conditions
governing my stay in Norway, both with the letter and with the
spirit, at least as I understand them. It develops, however, that
the chief of the Central Passport Bureau has interpreted these
conditions in quite a different m anner and, as far as I am aware,
his interpretation is approved by you, the minister. As I am
deeply concerned in further enjoying for myself and my wife the
favor of Norwegian institutions, I would be prepared to accept the
interpretation of the conditions, of which I was not made aware
before my coming to Norway, if I could gain the conviction that
this new interpretation could be reconciled with my dignity as a
human being and as a writer. I can only sign what I have clearly
understood and what I can really undertake to fulfill. According
to the chief of the Central Passport Bureau-who, incidentally,
when I came into the country, gave me a somewhat hostile
interview without waiting for any action of any kind on my
part-my activities are to be confined solely to "historical works
and general theoretical essays which are not directed against any
country."
How am I to interpret this limitation? Is, for example, my
autobiography a general theoretical essay or a topical political
work? Three weeks ago I wrote a detailed analysis of the
development of the Soviet Union. I myself am compelled to pass
judgment now: I have the impression that this work contributes
no small service to social science.
On the other hand, this work, by the mere concrete analysis of
facts, is directed against the ruling bureaucratic caste, which is
continuing to exploit the people economically and suppress it
politically. Is it really possible in a democratic country to accept
the stricture that the chief of the Passport Bureau may decide
whether this work is only scientific or also politically topical?
422
A Letter to Trygue Lie 423
I could quote an incomparably greater and more worthy

example. My great teacher and m aster, Karl Marx, wrote a book
called Capital. I try to imagine for a moment that the chief of the
Passport Bureau had to decide whether this elaborate work was
only scientific or whether it also had a topical political character.
The decision would not be so easy to make, for this work, built
upon the granite foundation of science, is illustrated by
thousands of topical examples and has as a whole today far
greater political importance than on the day of its first
appearance. It is not a coincidence that the whole struggle of
reaction, of the official and unofficial type, is directed against
Marxism and Marxists.
The chief of the Passport Bureau reproaches me for an article
in which I took the position that the struggle in France could only
end with a victory for military reaction or with the building of
soviets. Perhaps I am mistaken in my analysis. In any case I
attribute to this analysis a thoroughly scientific character. The
article in question appeared in the universally known bourgeois
democratic journal, the Nation. If I had written an article in
which I explained theoretically the general adv antages of an
autocratic regime over democracy, would this article have been
disapproved by the chief of the Passport Bureau? Unfortunately,
this question is not yet clear to me, especially after the visit I had
today from the chief of the Passport Bureau.
The declaration demanded of m e includes also the promise "not
to allow myself to be interviewed by any Norwegian or foreign
journalist. " During the whole of my stay in Norway up to the last
days I have given only one single interview, that is, to the editor
of Arbeiderbladet, and this, sir, in your own presence, and even
with you kindly taking part, which even now I appreciate. You
may perhaps recall that I personally tried to avoid even this
single interview in order to provoke as little noise and sensation
as possible in connection with my name.
But now the question is different. I have been accused by the
judicial authorities in Moscow of being the organizer of terrorist
acts . The entire world press is dealing with this historic trial. If
you , as minister of j ustice, or the authorities controlled by you, or
the Norwegian government, deem it possible or likely that I hav e
misused my sojourn i n Norway o r anywhere else for this kind of
activity, I expect immediately a warrant for my arrest. I desire
nothing else than to have the opportunity to bring into the light
of day, before an open juridical forum, this monstrous crime of
the GPU and of the powers behind it. But if the Norwegian
Trygve Lie.
authorities deem it impossible to interfere in this affair, they have

the duty-I repeat, the elementary duty, which is not necessarily
even a democratic one-to allow me complete liberty to tell the
truth to the whole world by the means at my individual disposal.
The principal means of informing public opinion is through the
press. To refrain from bringing me to trial before a Norwegian
court and at the same time to rob me of the opportunity to appeal
to public opinion on a question that concerns myself, my son, my
whole political past, and my political honor, would mean to
transform the right of asylum into a trap and to allow free
passage to the executioners and slanderers of the GPU.
These are the reasons which make it impossible for me to fulfill
the demand of the chief of the Central Passport Bureau to sign
the declaration which he has presented to me without drawing
the attention of the government and of public opinion in advance
to the unforeseeable consequences of such action for the moral
existence of myself and my family.
L. Trotsky
TRIAL S WITHOUT END419
August 27, 1936
I am in the process of reading the accounts of the trial in

Pravda. They make me choke with disgust. To imagine such
shamelessness, such stupidity, such perfidy, is not an easy task,
even for a politician. Anyone who could take this affair for good
coin would be forever dead in my eyes.
This trial, however, is not the last one. At the end of the
Zinoviev-Kamenev trial in January 1935 , I wrote: "Since the
amalgam, mainly in regard to me, came to a pitiful failure, Stalin
will inevitably try to stage another, better prepared, trial." After
the latest trial, this forecast must be applied in a still larger
sense. Sixteen men have been executed only to identify the word
"Trotskyism" with "terrorism." There lay the whole meaning of
the trial. Now new secret courts will be convoked, where anyone
branded as a " Trotskyist" could at once be shot as a terrorist.
Stalin turned the sixteen unfortunate and miserable men-some
exhausted, emptied, stupefied-and the young informers who had
hoped to make careers-into bloody pulps, only the better to reach
me personally.
The defendants tried to help Stalin with all their might. All the
testimony, all the threads, all the denunciations led, it was said,
to me. And the more you read this denunciation, the more you
have a feeling of a vacuum. The public trial was only possible
after a previous compromise between the GPU and the defen
dants. But Stalin did not stick to this compromise. He closed the
account with them through summary executions.
In March 1923, while Lenin was preparing a decisive attack
against Stalin for the Twelfth P arty Congress, when sending me
a series of letters and documents on that question from his
bedside, he had his secretary Fotieva say to me: " But do not
negotiate with Stalin, because he will make a rotten compromise,
and then he will betray." 42o Stalin has greatly developed this
425
quality ever since. Thus, he made a "rotten compromise" ( against

me) with the pitiful defendants of the trial, and then he betrayed
his partners, who were tied hand and foot. And how he betrayed
them!
As I said, there were only sixteen men on the defendants'
bench. But the defendants, who were simultaneousl y accusers
and self-accusers, incidentally mentioned scores of other n ames.
Safonova, Smirnov's former wife, was called from j ail as a
witness for the prosection aginst her former husband. She was
supposedly a Red Army officer and supposedly fomented a
"Trotskyist" plot among the Red officers. Like Reingold in the
trial of the sixteen, Safonova apparently will have to pl ay a role
in the coming trial as the m ain GPU agent. But she will have to
pay for that role the way Reingold did, i.e., with her own li fe.
I find strange words in Reingold's statement. He claims to have
been in charge of covering up the traces of terrorist acts after the
seizure of power by the conspirators. How? "Through the
physical annihilation of the functionaries of the Commissariat of
Internal Affairs (GPU), who could have had some knowledge of
the preparation of the terrorist acts, as well as of those who had
executed those acts in practice." In other words: the wretched
rascals thrust onto the defendants the idea of the very same
bloody job that tomorrow the GPU will carry out on the
defendants themselves.
Another fact that sheds a horrible light on the Bonapartist
clique: Pravda's commentaries on the trial are written by
Zaslavsky, who in every line takes it for granted that my link to
the Gestapo and that of others are proven. In 19 1 7 the same
Zaslavsky, in Dyen (The D ay)-a bank newspaper-was the most
rabid enemy of the Bolsheviks. He accused Leni n, myself, and
others of s erving the German general staff. In a series of articles
written in 19 1 7 , Lenin characteristically repeated: " Z aslavsky
and other rascals . . . . " This rascal now supports Stalin's
"Bolshevism" against us, the agents of the Gestapo. No
theoretical or poetic fantasy, neither that of a Marx nor that of a
Shakespeare, could invent such an arrangement. But life knows
how to do s o .
I still h o p e t o see this unprecedented crime exposed. I want,
through this letter, to contribute a little to it. The rest will come
with time.
LETT E R TO MR. PUNTE RVOLD 4 21
September 1 5 , 1936
Dear Mr. Puntervold:

In connection with the exchange of diplomatic notes between
the Soviet and Norwegian governments threatening my person, I
would like to state my opinion and note the following points as
concisely as possible:
1 . The Soviet government does not consider it possible to
demand my extradition. Why? What is at issue here is murder
and attempted murder. The existence of a terrorist conspiracy in
which I am supposed to have taken part-nay, which I am
supposed to have led-has now been "establishe d." The evidence
must have been completely incontestable; otherwise they could
not have shot sixteen men. Why didn't they demand my
extradition before the trial began? Why was the trial announced
and carried out at such a feverish tempo? Why do they refuse to
present evidence of my guilt either to foreign attorneys or to the
Norwegian courts? If they had done this they would have gained
two very important advantages: (1) With a single sweep they
could have dispelled the doubts about the trial held by the entire
civilized world; (2) I, the alleged principal conspirator, would
have been delivered to justice and punished. But in fact they did
not do this. Why? Because they have no proof, not even a shred of
such proof. Because the whole thing is a deliberate, cold-blooded
frame-up, which would not hold up under even the most remote
contact with independent criticism. Moscow's diplomatic stance
demanding my expulsion, not my extradition-is proof of
bankruptcy which Soviet justice renders against itself. World
public opinion must be enlightened by this.
2. Like me, my son has been found guilty without having been
formally indicted. It is my son who is supposed to have selected
the remarkable Gestapo terrorists and who is supposed to have
sent them to Moscow. At the present time my son is in France.
But the Soviet government addresses its "hostile" notes only to
427
the Norwegian government, not to the French government. Why?

Because France-with its colonies-is bigger? Should j ustice be
measured in. square miles? Or is it because they fear a more
energetic rebuff from France? I won't go into this here. I merely
wish to establish a very important fact: Moscow has attempted to
put pressure on the Norwegian government alone.
3. I will, of course , take up the Norwegian government's
answer here from a purely legal and not a political point of view.
Moscow s ays in essence the following: Trotsky organizes acts of
terrorism; we call upon you to expel him. The Norwegian
government answers: But we have in fact interned him.
Interpreters, of whom there will be no lack, can interpret this to
mean that the Norwegian government interned me because of my
"terrorist" activities. But the real circumstances are quite
different.
The Norwegian authorities' action against me began before the
first Tass dispatch concerning the projected trial was made
public. Neither the chief of police, nor the hearing judge, nor the
minister of justice ever mentioned a single word about "terrorist"
acts. The Central Passport Bureau's report (complaint?), which
was approved as the b asis for interning my wife and me, only
mentions my political-literary activities, namely, as follows:
"The Central Passport Bureau takes it that Trotsky's activities
do not overstep the conditions of his visa insofar as they are
confined to historical or for the most part scientific treatments of
social, economic, or political questions . . . .
"If, however, these observations touch upon current political
situations or indicate courses of action in such situations, then
the Central Passport Bureau takes it that his literary activities
are political activities of the sort that are at variance with the
conditions set in his residence visa."
And further:
"The Central Passport Bureau believes that there is reason to
assume that Trotsky's activities while residing in Norway do
include such statements and advice concerning current political
situations and that this may be characterized as a violation of
conditions set for residence. This is evident from, inter alia, a
newspaper article that advises the building of soviets in France
in order to further a continued revolutionary movement in
France."
Hence the Central Passport Bureau does not accuse me of
attempting to topple Russian soviets in alliance with the Gestapo,
but rather of attempting to aid the establishment of soviets in
Letter to Mr. Puntervold 429
France through my articles and letters. In other words, I was

interned because, as an author, I write in the spirit of the Fourth
Interna tional; that is, I have remained true to my former world
view. It seems to me that establishing this is of the utmost
importance for avoiding any sort of false, dishonest presentation
of the reasons for our internment.
4. The Soviet government's last note says that the Norwegian
government " bears full responsibility for the consequences of
Trotsky's continued stay in Norway." This phrase might easily
be considered a diplomatic formula in order to cover a retreat. In
my opinion this would be rash and foolish.
Viewed in the mirror of world opinion, the Moscow trial has
been a terrible fiasco. Nevertheless , sixteen men have been
executed. The "leaders" cannot quietly let the matter rest here.
Just as the GPU was forced, after the miserable failure of the first
Kirov trial in J anuary 1935, to prepare the second trial (as I
publicly predicted in due course), they now have no other choice
than to discover new "assassination attempts, " new "conspira
cies, " etc., in order to bolster the accusations against me. In
addition, they must attempt to transfer my "terrorist" base of
operations from Copenhagen to Oslo. A new chapter in the book
of amalgams is beginning.
5. In this connection, the following question must be raised:
Why, in this whole affair, did the GPU seize upon the unfortunate
device of dragging in Copenhagen, where I spent a mere eight or
nine days? It would have been much smarter to set these
"terrorist" meetings in Turkey, where I spent four and a half
years. The answer is obvious: they need Copenhagen as a parallel
or prelude to Oslo, i.e., as a device for pressuring the Norwegian
government. But as you well know, they have m ade total fools of
themselves with this parallel. In order to extricate themselves
they have no other choice than to invent a new amalgam. New
trials are called for. New provocateurs are at work. That is the
meaning of this sentence concerning the Norwegian govern
ment's reply.
6 . But how can the GPU conjure up an Oslo amalgam? I must
admit, I do not know. Perhaps the GPU does not yet know itself.
In any case, it will not be easy. But it must be done because there
is too much at stake for the leaders.
I can only suggest some hypotheses about what possible
courses of action the GPU may follow:
a. Among the sixteen who were executed there was not one
single "Trotskyist": all of them-leaving aside the provocateilrs-
were individuals who had already capitulated in 1 928-29, and

were my bitterest opponents from that time on. I, for my p art, for
eight years continually treated these capitulators in the press as
traitors and individuals without character. These people, who
had prostrated themselves before the ruling bureaucracy for
years, were wax in the hands of the GPU. But there are real
Trotskyists in the Soviet Union. Many thousands of them have
been in prison since 1 928. Until now, these people have not been
suitable for the GPU's amalgams. That is the explanation for this
monstrous "paradox" (to avoid calling it by its right name
nonsense) that I should have carried out my terrorist activities
not hand-in-hand with my real friends and supporters, but with
open capitulators and sullen opponents . That all of them were my
enemies, they proved well enough during the trial.
The real Trotskyists have not, as I have said, been suitable for
the GPU's amalgams up till now. But now, after the trial, they
will face an ultimatum with a gun at their heads: "confess " or
die. It is possible that some of them will surrender under this
hellish pressure and will thereafter be used for a new show trial.
For which one? I have no way of knowing.
b . The shooting of the sixteen, the suicides, the imprisonment
of more thousands, the starvation of more tens of thousands, the
intolerable campaign of provocations-all this can give rise to
real terrorist tendencies among part of the youth. This has
always been the case in Russia, and it can be so this time too . As
in the Nikolaev affair, the GPU tries to fan the flames of
terrorism with all its might. In this way it can rid itself of an
oustanding official who has become uncomfortable in his role
and at the same time initiate a whole new trial against the
"Trotskyists. "
The GPU's art will consist in finding new Olbergs, Berman
Yurins, etc. , who will have received their orders direct from Oslo.
Who knows, Mr. Puntervold, a GPU agent might approach you,
in the most cordial way, to ask you about my health, and then
later this scoundrel may testify that the reason he visited
Puntervold was to receive instructions from Trotsky written in
invisible ink concerning acts of terrorism. " For security reasons"
he will naturally have burned the instructions at a later time. In
order to make his testimony more complete, he might also steal a
few addressed envelopes from your desk (the GPU's techniques
are in any case not inferior to those of the Norwegian Nazis). The
last Moscow trial could not produce such "evidence," but that did
not prevent them from carrying out sixteen death sentences.
Letter to Mr. Punteruold 431
Someone might say that after the experience with the sixteen
who paid for their false confessions with their lives , no one else
will cooperate in staging a similar trial. An illusion . The trial of
the sixteen was not the first of that genre and is not the last.
People who are in the hands of the GPU don't have much choice,
and in the bargain the GPU will tell the vacillators : "We shot
those people because they really were terrorists, but you are
innocent, so you have nothing to fear." And so it goes.
Thus I say that from the point of view of diplomacy, the Stalin
clique has made a tactical retreat (for the moment there was
nothing else they could do) but only in order to be in a better
position to make a strategic attack. That is the meaning of the
impudent threat about the Norwegian government's "full
responsibility" for my "terrorist" activities. Sapienti sat [To know
is enough].
With best greetings,
Leon Trotsky
ECHOES O F A BELGIAN
WITCH-HUNT 4 22
September 23, 1936
I did not participate in any plan for insurrection, either in

Spain or in Belgium . However, now, as well as before, I have
always expressed my historical opinions and my experience, that
is, that the working class mus t p repare itself militarily in order to
repulse armed attacks from fascists or from any other side.
Take Spain , for instance. It is possible that they might have
hesitated too long there. This m ust not be repeated . The working
class must understand that it is the workers who make the
weapons and that, consequently, they must also get some, and
this before the bourgeois counteraction could be carried out, as
happened in Spain.
It is not at all necessary to search for so-called secret letters of
mine. I only expressed my general , theoretical, and practical
opinions, such as can be drawn from my articles , which have
appeared for a long time and still appear in the international
press. Let me also point out to you my pamphlets. The latest one
is called Whither France ? and I only finished it on June 10 of this
year; it was published in German, French, and English.
Here is a letter which I j ust received through the C entral
Passport Bureau from Walter Dauge, who was named by the
newspapers . If he and I were preparing a clandestine insurrec
tion, he would certainly not send me letters through the Central
Passport Bureau. Actually, it is Spaak who , together with Dauge,
visited me in France in 1 934 .423 We discussed at the time the
possibility of uniting the opposition groups which were fighting
among themselves within the B elgian workers' movement.
Spaak is currently minister of foreign affairs in Belgium and,
consequently, the Belgian representative at the League of
Nations. If a search for letters of mine is of any interest, it would
be at the ministry of foreign affairs that the Belgian police should
carry it out.
432
Echoes of a Belgian Witch-Hunt 433
Jean Delvin, who, to judge from the dispatches, allegedly

conspired with me to send arms to Spain, is a person I have never
seen. He is totally unknown to me, except that I just found out he
is secretary of the Belgian Labor Party-I am not a member of
this party.
LETTERS TO A N ATTORNEY 4 2 4
S eptember - O ctober 1936
S eptember 28 , 1936
Dear Friend:
You have been informed about the suit that we have
undertaken with Mr. Michael Puntervold against the slanderers
(unfortunately, those of the second order . . . for the time
being) .425 I beg you to accord us your aid in this matter by all the
means at your disposal, the most precious of which are your
friendship and loyalty.
My warmest greetings.
October 1936
Dear Friend:
I am sending my letter for the IFTU to Lyova [Leon Sedov] at
the same time.426 I hope that the letter will be transmitted
immediately and that all the necessary pressure will be exerted to
elicit an immediate decision.
I propose-as an example-that they send an IFrU lawyer
here, so I can go over the matter with him. That would be a
beginning.
My best wishes for you and our friends.
Attached is my power of attorney.
October 1936
March 21, 1935427

My Dear Friend:
I ask you to continue publishing my works and to add this care
434
Letters to an Attorney (Sept.- Oct. 1936) 435
to defending the general interests that I have entrusted to your

charge.
I will be happy to receive your visit soon, in order to pursue
these matters with you further.
Very truly yours,
Leon Sedov [Trotsky]
O ctober 1 93 6 42 8
Q: How is it possibl e that the extravagance and the immod

erateness of the accusations of terrorism and of collusion with the
Gestapo h ave not provoked an outbreak in public opinion?
A: The lies were so unusual, so cynical, so incredible, that

public opinion reacted to them as though stupefied.
Q: It is hard for us to realize how these leaders of the revolution

could lower themselves to such idiotic and abj ect confessions
these people whom we considered men of steel.
A: You know, Kamenev and Zinoviev h ave been on the path of

confessions for seven years. Seven years ago, at the time of the
Fifteenth Congress, they renounced their agreement with the
Opposition so as to avoid being kicked out of the p arty; that
capitulation was the first confession. After that decapitation
there was nothing to do but go step by step down the road of
confessions, of disavowals, of humiliation . The GPU took care of
it.
O ctober 9, 1 9 3 6
T h e authorities j ust this minute returned m y letter t o the IFTU.

I don't know whether it is simply a m atter of excessive zeal on the
part of the Passport B ureau or whether it was a political decision.
I do not want to believe that a "workers' " government would
want to prevent me from addressing myself to the IFTU on the
question of my defense and the defense of many others. The
scandal would surely be too loud and full of consequences. No
matter: you know my ideas on the subj ect. You are my lawyer.
You are invested with full powers on my behalf. Please address
yourself directly and immediately to the IFTU with the proposal
to delegate a responsible representative.
My best wishes.
O ctober 22, 1936
Dear Friend:
I completely approve of your letter to the secretariat of the
IFTU. You should send a copy to Fenner Brockway and one to
Thadder. Walter D auge writes: " On the matter of the trial , you
should address yourself only to the organizations that have
already expressed themselves in favor of an international
commission. " This formal intransigence is not correct. If we
didn't address ourselves to the C omintern, such an appeal would
b e only a futile gesture and even a little stupid. But if the
C omintern, under pressure from below, feels itself forced to send
delegates to the international commission of inquiry, so much the
better. We will be the beneficiaries.
I heard through the TSF [French radio] that your father made
an important presentation on questions of public health at the
Radical congress . From that I conclude with satisfaction that his
own health is at least satisfactory.
And you? Are you quite recovered? When you visited us, you
had a rather fatigued air. Moreover, you had all the bother with
the Central Passport Bureau . . . .
Please establish permanent contact with my Czech attorneys,
Fr. Bill and Mr. Adler. I have decided on a similar trial in
Prague.429 I am even inclined in favor of a trial in Paris, if it is
possible. Maybe also in Switzerland. In the matter of the German
j o urnalist B. Jacob, the Berne government has shown that it
knows how to defend its independence and dignity against a big
state. Hitler had to give in. Brutal pressure on the judges by the
Berne government cannot be expected. Think about it. In such
cases, it is sometimes preferable to deal with a " conservative"
government that knows what it wants than with a "socialist"
government that is afraid of its own shadow . . . .
If a trial in P aris is virtually impossible, because of the
legislation itself, then from now on we must study the situation in
Letters to an Attorney (Sept.- Oct. 1 936) 437
Switzerland, in Holland, and in B elgium, even in C atalonia,

where Andres Nin is minister of j ustice.
Think about it, my friend, consult your friends, let me know
your opinion, and above all begin making arrangements right
away, without wasting any time.
My warmest greeting.
COMMENTS ON D E FENSE E FFORTS43 0
October 3, 1936
My Dear Lyova:
I am sending the final draft of the manuscript of the book on
the USSR [The Revolution Betrayed]. I have sent the Bureau its
copies from here.
Did you keep your passport with the French visa ( 1 932)?
Who is Vyshinsky?431 The Mensheviks write that he came out
of their ranks. All the same, this fact should be given a well
deserved popularity, with all the necessary details. As for me, I
know nothing about him.
Are you aware that some people want to put on a parallel trial
in Prague (Sonne, Keller, etc.)? 4 :l2 I have some doubts on that
score, but perhaps it would be good to accept the proposition.
What is your thinking on this matter? Here things are going very
slowly . . . .
Did you receive my letter to the IFTU?
Did you receive my letter to Mr. Puntervold concerning the
diplomatic correspondence between the USSR and Norway?
Please inform me when you receive each document; otherwise I
haven't the slightest control over my own correspondence.
I have received from Van* Muste's document (as far as I can
tell).433 There is nothing to be done . . . . Many people have asked:
How could Zinoviev and the others have capitulated so misera
bly? They don't take into consideration the amount of continuous
pressure. The Mustes, the Schmidts, etc., have shown themselves
incapable of withstanding one-thousandth the amount of pres
sure. All in all, the power of moral resistance of Zinoviev,
Kamenev, etc . , was much greater than average, but it was
demonstrated to be insufficient under these quite exceptional
circumstances. That's all.
*Inform Van about this; he requested confirmation.
438
Comments on Defense Efforts 439
The two documents from S. Schwartz about the trial are quite
substantive and serious, especially for someone who had only the
official documents.434
Ha ve m y archives in France been put in order? I greatly doubt
it. However, it is a very important matter. The fact that the letter
from Spaak ( 1 934) has still not been found is extremely bad. The
copies of my 1 933-34 letters have a supreme importance. The
archives must be put in order.
My health has not been very good lately; a change for the
worse in the past two weeks . . . .
I embrace you,
Your Papa
THE SAFETY OF THE ARCHIVE S435
O ctober 1 0 , 1 9 3 6
M y Dear Lyova:
Enclosed is my letter to Pfemfert, so that I won't have to write
the same thing twice.
In my preceding letters, I asked you several questions. But I am
afraid that the work is not going well; everyone is either acting
individually, or else waiting for someone else to do something
(that is, absolutely nothing is happening). What I have received
up till now seems to be very sparse.
1. Where is your passport with the French visa from 1932 for
your trip from Germ any to France?
2. Has anyone in France taken steps to find Mama' s telegram
to Herriot about your visa in the French Foreign Ministry ( or the
office of the premier)? 4 :l 6
On these two questions, which are decisive, I h ave still received
no answer.
I have worked out instructions for searching for some
documents of the highest importance in C openhagen. I will send
them tomorrow through Puntervold.
The GPU is going to do everything in its power to get its hands
on my archives . It would be best to deposit them with an
established scientific institution. Professor Posthumus wanted to
buy them for the Dutch institute.4J7 It would be even better
perhaps to find an American institute. You can write to our
American friends as a preliminary m easure. This question can
become very pressing.
Your Old Man
P. S.-Pfemfert appears to have a new address, which I do not

have.
Enclosure: Letter to Pfemfert.
Please, let me know exactly the number of letters that you
receive from me and the questions they contain. Copy them and
send me the copies; otherwise I will have no control over my own
correspondence.
T.
440
LETTER TO THE IFTU438
O ctober 22, 1 9 3 6
To the Permanent Administrative C ommittee o f the IFTU
D ear Sirs:
As legal attorney and N orwegian repres entative of the interests
of Leon Trotsky, I am addressing you on the following m atter.
As you h ave been able to learn from the newspapers, I have
filed suit on behalf of my client against the N orwegi an
Communist paper A rbeideren and against the Norwegian fascist
newspaper Vrit Volk, for accusing my client of being an
"individual terrorist," " cowardly assassin," " author of the
[assassination] attempt," etc . , charges that have their origins in
the Moscow trial against Zinoviev, K amenev, and others.
However, while the results of such a proceeding will be s ufficient
to absolve my client and his son from the most outrageous of the
accusations, they will be completely insufficient to fully illumi
nate the Moscow trial and its underpinnings.
Since, during the Moscow trial, you s ought to intervene by
telegram on behalf of the accused, and in light of the fate of
Mikhail Tomsky-the eminent leader of the trade union move
ment who was driven to suicide by the accusations brought
against him-I propose on behalf of my client the formation of an
international commission of inquiry, composed of trade unionists,
political figures, and renowned j urists. If you could appoint a
competent j urist who had your complete confidence to serve on it,
my client would be very pleased. Leon Trotsky is ready to submit
to the most detailed examination by such a j urist, and to study
the m aterials from the M oscow trial with him. In my client's
opinion, the fact that h e has lived abroa d for the last seven and
one-half years will extraordinarily simplify the work of such a
commission of inquiry, even in the event that the leadership of
the Third International and of the S oviet government should
refuse to collaborate with such a commission. Their refusal to
441
participate in the inquiry could not, in our opinion, constitute a

reason for failing to undertake this work In the Moscow trial,
Leon Trotsky and his son Leon Sedov were accused and convicted
"in absentia," without having the opportunity to defend them
selves_ Now the S oviet government declines to prove the truth of
its accusations before an international forum_ But the principal
defendant in the Moscow trial of terrorists, my client Leon
Trotsky, must have the full right to prove the falseness of the
accusations against him before an international commission of
inquiry, even in the event that the Soviet authorities fail to atten d
because o f bad faith.
In view of the urgency of the matter; in view of the
preparations, already announced , for a new "terrorists' trial" in
the USSR (involving, among others, even Radek, the writer who
was even yesterday praised as an authority in the Soviet press
and in the press of the entire Comintern); in view of the
possibility of new steps by the Soviet government in Norway
against Leon Trotsky; and above all, in view of the damage that
all this does to the prestige of the entire workers' movement, I ask
that you take this letter under advisement as s o on as possible
and acquaint m e with your decision.
I ought to p oint out, moreover, that my client, because of
measures that have been taken, is unfortunately prevented from
addressing himself to you in person, which he would certainly do
under other circumstances.
Very truly yours,
Michael Puntervold
P.S.-I am sending copies of this letter to the Secretariat of the

Second International, in Brussels; to the Secretariat of the
International B ureau of Revolutionary Socialist Parties, in
London; to the International Secretariat for the Fourth Interna
tional, in Geneva. For reasons that are easy to understand, I am
not addressing myself to the leadership of the Comintern. If,
however, the C o mintern, under the pressure of p ublic opinion,
should decide to p articipate in the work of the commission, then
in the inro;'sts of my client and of our case I will only be able to
rej oice.
LETTER TO
THE L E A GUE OF NATIONS439
October 22, 1 936
The statutes of the future international tribunal against

terrorists are at present being examined by a commission of
jurists. The tribunal must assume the task of protecting the
interests of governments against terrorist attacks that are
prepared or even executed outside the given state. It appears self
evident that the same tribunal must have the opportunity to
safeguard the interests of individuals against whom, for purely
political reasons, false accusations of terrorism are made, to
jeopardize their activities, which h ave nothing to do with
terrorism, and even their existence on this planet.
That is the situation of Leon Trotsky today. I am certain that
the Soviet government, which has demanded his expulsion from
Norway and which has thereby created great difficulties for him
and his family, will in no case bring this matter before the
international tribunal, after its creation, since a public j udgment
could only expose the criminal machinations of the GPU. Under
these circumstances, Leon Trotsky must have the right to address
himself to the international tribunal, since that government has
done him harm. If the government in question should refuse to
take p art in the tribunal's deliberations, the official accusations
brought by it, with all their international consequences, must be
declared null and void.
The necessary details and rules, in my opinion, should be
introduced in the statutes of the future tribunal.
443
LETTE RS TO AN ATTORNEY4 4 0
Late October 1936
October 30, 1936
Schevenels's arguments are inconsistent44 1 . . . but unfortu

nately a new trial against "economic" sabotage by the "Trotsky
ists" is being prepared in Moscow (or in Kiev) right now. But isn't
this "economic" falsification worthy of the attention of the "trade
union" leaders? It would be necessary to have a commission of
sages to classify this scum by categories: "Political scum," "trade
union scum." But even in this case, it would be necessary to
create a special category for the "combination scum." This
gallery would unquestionably be the largest . . . .
All the conditions indicate Switzerland as a country where it
would be possible to have a trial without hindrance. Make
inquiries, please. True, we are very handicapped. But no matter.
We will have the last word, and it will be decisive.
Regards.
October 3 1 , 1936
Dear Friend:
I am simultaneously sending an important letter on the trial,
which is a severe critique of Rosenmark's report (without naming
him).442 I believe that the letter will be quite useful to you in
connection with the Red Book. 443 You will receive Leon's letter.
444
REMARKS ABOUT THE
ARB E IDERBLADET INTERVIEW444
November 1 0 , 1 93 6
Dear Comrade:
Please excuse my silence. I wasn't feeling well, but today I am
somewhat better. Thanks for Kampf und Kultur. I really don't
know why you mention my annoyance in connection with your
article. I assume it was j ust a j oke. That you perhaps differentiate
yourself from me politically? This is something that I consider
both natural and necessary, and expedient in this matter as well.
In your essay you refer to an interview with me that was
published in Arbeiderbladet on July 26, 1935. Now I must make
the following remarks about this interview: Present were the
minister of j ustice, M. Tranmael, O. Kolbjornsen, and the whole
Knudsen family.445 Right at the outset, I said: "I would prefer not
to give an interview, since I wish to avoid any controversy . " But
then the minister of justice (!) replied: "No, since we have granted
you asylum, we must also have a statement from you for our
public. "
Kolbjornsen's questions were purely political. I refused com
ment on several of these questions because they would have
required overly sharp answers from me, and I did not wish to deal
with the Soviet bureaucracy too sharply in Arbeiderbladet. At
that time, however, Kolbjornsen was of quite another mind than
he is today: he made my statements sharper. Therefore, I
requested that the text be sent to me for revision before
publication-which was done. I thoroughly softened the tone of
Kolbjornsen's text and even completely deleted some things. I
hope that the two versions can still be found and compared.
Since that time, the gentlemen have changed their opinion of
the Soviet bureaucracy. That is their privilege. I cannot deny
anyone the right to adopt better (or more comfortable) views . But
in the process they accuse me of violating the "agreement" -and
445
that is not right. I hope I shall be able to prove this to the

Storting [Norwegian parliament] with documents, facts, etc.
I wonder whether this letter will not be confiscated by the
minister of j ustice? This sort of thing has already happened to
me. But I am making this attempt just to see how far the abuse of
authority will go in things which have nothing to do with the
"interests of the state. "
The French edition of my book on the USSR has already
appeared. Unfortunately I have only one copy . As soon as I get
some more, I will send you one. Have you read the Red Book and
V. Serge's piece [Sixteen Executed in Moscow]? What kind of
impression did these things make on you? Did you find them
convincing enough?
Best greetings,
L. Trotsky
ON THE GPU ' S THEFT O F ARCHIVE S446
Nov ember 1 0 , 1 936
Dear Comrade:
I just received your letter of November 7 .
I h ave also just now received the following telegram from my
son in Paris: "Some archives of secondary importance, entrusted
to Dutch Institute, P aris branch, ransacked (by) GP u. Am
instituting civil action. Leon." I now anticipate a burglary in
Norway, for the GPU must take possession of my papers,
especially since the publication of the Red Book. As for the letters
that I am writing for my " defense" (i.e., the indictment of the true
criminal), they have been confiscated, one after the other. Such is
the face of "democracy" ! . . .
My warmest greetings to your family, your dear wife, our friend
Karin (we are glad that she is well again) , and to Eli, little Eli.
Yours,
L. Trotsky
447
LETTERS TO AN ATTORNEY 44 7
November 1936
November 12, 1936
Dear Friend:
Thank you for the two letters that I have j ust received, along
with the good news about your father.
I sent you perhaps three weeks ago a memorandum on the trial ,
designed for Mr. Rosenmark and others. You have not mentioned
it. However, it would be absolutely incredible for the Passport
Bureau to seize this document, which contains the essence of my
"defense" (that is, of my accusation of the real criminals). I gave
my expose the form of a critique of some of Pritt's statements.4 4 8 I
draw your attention to this document in particular!
Please do not write to me from now on about your practical
steps (research, telegrams, etc.) since this information can bring
you additional difficulties.
On the other hand, please communicate to me everything you
know about the "influence" of the Red Book, the Victor Serge
pamphlet, and my Revolution Betrayed. Please write me about
this (and invite others to write) in a detailed manner.
Don't you think that I ought to write directly to Victor
Basch?449
The signers of the appeal are not all known abroad.450 A list
should be prepared with a description of each one.
Gide's preface shows, all in all, an honest effort to orient
himself.451 It is not the sanctimonious and conformist senility of
Romain Rolland, not at all.
And Jules Romains?452 Now he is the one who is "above the
conflict."
My best wishes.
448
Gerard Rosenthal, Leon Sedov, and M aurice Delepine, at the office of the
examining magistrate in the case of the theft of Trotsky's archives by the GPU.
November 1 3 , 1 9 3 6
I a m very pleased with the signature of Jules Romains. I have

great admiration for that artist. Aside from his gifts of creativity,
he is incomparably perspicacious: if he were interested in this
matter, he could make an exceptional book of it. And not only a
book.
November 1 8 , 1 93 6
Dear Friend:
This morning I sent you the following telegram: "Request you
and Mr. Delepine453 institute civil action in matter theft my
archives. Letter follows. L.T. "
Herewith is my official letter to you and Delepine.
Please correct my wretched French and have a new copy made
of the text. To this end I attach a signed carte blanche.
I believe that I have understood you well and that my letter will
be sufficient even for an attorney. My correspondence is
submitted to a more and more restrictive censorship. Worst of all
is that I never know whether the letter has been passed through
or not. For example, I do not know if the three copies of the
manuscript of my book on the USSR were sent or not. Nor do I
know whether you have received my notes on Pritt, which are-it
seems to me-of great importance for the counter-trial.
My best wishes.
November 22, 1 9 3 6
M y Dear Friend:
I have received your letter of November 17. I am awaiting a
visit from Mr. Puntervold so he can explain to me the meaning of
the most recent decision of the government concerning the trial
abroad:454 does it mean that I cannot defend myself, even against
the thieves? I do not believe that at all. I do not want at the same
time to hide from you the fact that the same decision contains a
scarcely veiled threat of extradition. If it were a matter of a legal
Letters to an A t to rney (November 1936) 451
proceeding, that i s , the verification by a Norwegian tribunal of a

demand for extradition on Moscow's part, I could only rej oice.
But no; the government decision alludes to extradition rather as a
purely administrative measure, as a "punishment" for my bad
attitude, the latter consisting of my insistent attempts to defend
myself against the most infamous accusations in m odern history.
It is true that by the same decision the government leaves me
the right to seek a sylum elsewhere. I am officially informing you
of it at this tim e , as my attorney. But I do not h ave any grand
illusions about this "right" in present-day Europe, of which the
maj ority is in the hands of fascism and the minority is passing
more or less through the prefascist stage.
Moreover, the a ttitude of the Norwegian government toward me
gives all the other governments a powerful argument to refuse me
the right of asylum: " If the Norwegian government, which is to
the left of the Second International, etc., imprisoned Trotsky, h e
must have done something serious." But what does this
"something" boil down to?
1. I want-like everyone else-to have the right to publish my
articles and books within the framework of the l aws of the
respective countries.
2. I want-like everyone else-to have the right to defend
myself against the most ignominious slanders that can b e
imagined.
Precisely because of these two crimes I am interned-and even
threatened with still more rigorous measures. But this is
incredible! Yes, I tell myself that ten times a day, but that is the
reality.
Moreover, that is not all. The new government decision tells me
that-for reasons of "economy"-I will be transferred to another
place, with no details. The text does not even m ention Natalia.
You can easily imagine her terrible anxiety! What interest the
government could have in l eaving Natalia in this state of
anguish, anticipating a possible separation, cannot even be
explained. Perhaps it is only a simple oversight.
I am obliged to lay out thus our entire present situation so that
you will be able to use this description in whatever steps you can
take to win a uthorization for us to enter another country.
I have no need to tell you that we are more than ever allied with
N atalia in moral firmness and in the certainty of the justice of
our cause. I do what I must, come what may.
My best greetings to you and to all our friends.
When you let m e know whom to address on the question of the
visa (if I should make a personal request), I will explain the

factors that give me, in the present situation, the right to real
asylum-asylum which will not be a trap.
LETTER TO THE LEAGUE
FOR THE RIGHTS OF MAN455
D e cember 3, 1936
Sir:
I am informed by my attorney and friend, Mr. G. Rosenthal, of
the fact that a very important commission, presided over by you
personally, is in the process of examining the Moscow trial.
Permit me to say that I consider it absolutely impossible for
this commission to render an opinion on the " affair" without
having attempted to interview me. Hearing my son's testimony is
very important. However, I am the only one who is familiar with
all the workings of these "j udiciary" machinations, unique in the
history of the family of m an (and for which it was none the
poorer).
With my most sincere regards ,
Trotsky
453
LETTERS TO AN ATTO RNEY456
December 1936
December 10, 1936
I regret h aving sent a letter to Victor Basch. After the

publication of Rosenmark's unworthy report,457 this letter must
be considered null and void. Please inform Mr. B asch of that. As
soon as I am free, I will give all these gentlemen the reply they
deserve.
December 10, 1936
. As for our health, I had one very bad week, but the last 4-5
days have been better.
As for Mexico , I would be very pleased to leave for there as soon
as possible, on the condition that I am given the opportunity to
take all measures of security, etc.458 But this question is not taken
care of even now. The authorities dawdle and lie and the
situation can certainly change with regard to Mexico. Therefore,
the arrangements must be continued elsewhere. You are doubt
lessly doing it without my needing to ask you.
My warmest greetings.
December 10, 1936
Dear Friend:
It is now one week since I sent the text of my complaint about
the theft of my archives. Yesterday I learned that this document
has not yet been sent. It seems they find it reprehensible that I
speak of the GPU. It appears I must find an administrative
pseudonym for the thieves , who are incidentally agents of the
GPU . I am expecting a new law on this subject. Let the
examining magistrate proceed by the diplomatic path.
454
IN CLO SED COURT459
December 1 1, 1936
The government had at first planned that the group of fascists

who had broken into my home would be tried two weeks before
the elections : the trial might have been a trump card in the
election campaign. The government press kept stating that the
raiders could be s entenced to several years in j ail. But when my
wife and I were imprisoned, the government had the trial
postponed until after the elections, and the minister of j ustice no
longer saw allY thing more in the affair than a " childish prank."
So much for the inviolability of the law, the sanctity of j ustice!
The case came up in the district court of Drammen. On
December 11 I was called as a witness. The government, which
knew it could expect to hear ,othing favorable from me, either to
itself or to its Moscow allies, insisted that the trial take place in
closed court; understandably enough, it encountered no resistance
on this score. The defendants , typical representatives of a
declassed, petty-bourgeois youth, were at liberty. "Witness" and
plaintiff, I arrived at the courthouse surrounded by an entourage
of a dozen policemen .
The benches for the public were empty, and the police seated
themselves there. The pitiful heroes of the nocturnal raid were
seated at my right. They listened to me with unflagging
attention. The benches at my left were occupid by eighteen
j urors-workers and petty bourgeois. Finally, several high
functionaries were seated at the rear.
The closed court enabled me to answer all questions with
complete freedom . The president of the court did not once
interrupt me in the course of my testimony which, with the
translation from German, lasted almost four hours , although I
gave him several opportunities to do so. I do not have a
stenographic report of these proceedings, but I can vouch for the
almost literal accuracy of the following, which was written
immediately afterward, following an outline prepared in advance.
I spoke under oath . I assume full responsibility for what I say.
The Norwegian "Socialist" government insisted on a closed court;
I intend to open doors and windows.
455
The Author of the Internment
After routine question s of identification, the attorney for the

fascists, Mr. W . , began the interrogation.
Attorney W: What conditions were imposed on the witness upon

his arrival in Norway? H as the witness lived up to his
agreement? What was the cause of his internment?
Trotsky: I agreed not to intervene in Norwegian politics and

not to engage, in this country, in activities hostile to other
countries. I have irreproachably fulfilled these conditions. The
Central Passport Bureau has had to admit that I did not mix into
the affairs of the country. As to other countries, my activity has
been that o f a publicist. It is true that everything I write is of a
Marxist nature and consequently revolutionary. But the govern
ment, which itself occasionally invokes Marx, was aware of my
thinking when it granted me a visa. My works and my articles
always appear under my signature and have not in any w ay been
the object o f any legal actions.
Attorney W: During his visit to Weksal, didn't the minister of

justice explain to the witness the exact meaning of the conditions
he agreed to?
Trotsky: I did receive, shortly after my arrival, a visit from the

minister of j ustice. He was accompanied by Martin Tranmael, the
leader of the Norwegian Labor Party, and Mr. Kolbjornsen, editor
of its newspaper. The minister told me, with a timid smile, that he
hoped my activities would not include "thorns" (Stachel) directed
against other states. The word "thorns" did not appear v ery clear
to me, but since the minister spoke rather poor German, I did not
pursue the m atter. Basically, the situation can be summed up in
this way: The reactionary philistines imagine that I am
preparing to make Norway a base of operations for plots , for
shipping arms , etc. On these points I can, with a clear conscience,
reassure Messrs. Philistines and "Socialists," as well as others.
But I could not believe that the forbidden "thorns" could be
applied to p olitical critiques. I consider Norway a civilized and
democratic country-and I would not like, even today, to have to
change this opinion.
Attorney W: Didn't the minister of justice warn the witness that

he was not permitted to pu:blish
political questions?
In Closed Court 457
Trotsky: An interpretation of that kind might have seemed

improper to the minister himself. I have been a political writer for
forty years now. That is my profession, gentlemen of the jury and
j udges , and this profession is the essence of my being. Perhaps
the government demanded that I pay for my visa by renouncing
my convictions and my right to express them? No, the govern
ment slanders itself after the event. Moreover, immediately after
the minister of justice's somewhat mysterious remark about
"thorns ," Mr. Kolbj ornsen asked me for an interview for
Arbeiderbladet. Jokingly I asked the minister of j ustice: "But
won't this interview be viewed as mixing into Norwegian
politics?" The minister replied in these exact words: "No. We
have given you a visa; we have to make you known to our
public." It woul d seem that that was clear enough. I then
revealed, in the presence of M artin Tranmael and the minister of
j ustice, and with their tacit approval, that the Soviet government
had extended criminal aid to Italy during the Italian-Ethiopian
war;460 that the government in Moscow had, in general, become a
conservative factor; that the ruling c aste in Moscow systematical
ly falsifies history to give itself a more attractive place therein;
that a war in E urope is inevitable if the revolution does not
prevent it-and many other things. I doubt if one could find any
roses in this Arbeiderbladet interview, published July 26, 1935,
but it contains no lack of thorns!
Permit me also to recall that my autobiography had been
published a few months earlier by the Labor P arty Publishers .
The preface to this work unsparingly condemns the Byzantine
cult of the infallible "chief," the Bonapartist absolutism of Stalin
and his clique, and exposes the necessity of overthrowing the
bureaucratic caste. These pages go on to say that the struggle
against Soviet Bonapartism is the cause of my third exile. In
other words , if I agreed to renounce this struggle, I would have no
need of Norway's hospitality. And that isn't all, gentlemen of the
j ury and j udges! On August 21, one week before my internment,
Arbeiderbladet ran, on its front p age, a long interview with me
entitled, "Trotsky S hows Moscow Charges to B e Concoction of
Lies . " It is certainly believable that members of the government
read my revelations on the Moscow forgery. The decision to
intern me, made a week l ater, cited not this interview on current
matters, composed entirely of "thorns , " but old articles of mine
published in France and the United States.
The frame-up is unmistakable. I can further cite the testimony
of Minister of Foreign Mfairs Koht, who stated at an election
meeting about ten days before my internment that "there is no
doubt that the government knew that Trotsky would continue to

write his political articles, but thought it their duty to remain
faithful to the democratic principle of the right of asylum . " Mr.
Koht's speech was published by the government's official organ.
You have all read it. The public testimony of the minister of
foreign affairs categorically refutes the minister of j ustice. In
order to hide the truth from the public at the last moment, the
minister of justice has confiscated (from the possession of my
secretaries) the letter I wrote telling about the first political
interview that, with his cooperation, I had accorded the press. He
has brutally expelled my two collaborators from Nonvay. Why?
They are not even emigres. Their passports are in order. And
what is of far greater importance-they are men of impeccable
character.
Gentlemen of the j ury, in offering me asylum the Norwegian
government has set a trap for me. I cannot express myself
otherwise. Is it not monstrous to see a b ureau that is appointed to
control passports-passports !-controlling my scientific and
literary activities-and in other countries , to boot? If it had been
up to Messrs . Trygve Lie and Konstad, neither the Communist
Manifesto, nor Capital, nor other classics of revolutionary
thought, would have ever seen the light of day, because these are
works of political emigres. The government produces, as the most
pernicious example of my lethal activity, an article published
legally in France, and in a bourgeois weekly, the Nation, in the
United States . I am convinced that neither Leon Blum nor the
president of the United States has demanded the intervention of
the director of the Passport Bureau against my articles. It is
Moscow that has demanded that measures be taken against me,
but the Norwegian government refuses to admit this in order not
to acknowledge its dependence. And that is why it has justified
its action by this sham.
Attorney W: What is the attitude of the witness regarding the

Fourth International?
Trotsky: I support it. In a certain sense, I am the initiator of

this international tendency, and I assume the responsibility for
it.
Attorney W: Then the witness is dedicated to practical

revolutionary work?
Trotsky: It is not easy to separate theory from practice, and

In Closed Court 459
that is not at all my intention. But the conditions of my life in

"democratic" E urope do not permit me, to my keen regret, to
intervene in practical work. When the conference for the Fourth
International, held last summer, elected me a member of its
bureau in my absence (a title more honorary than practical, I
must say), I declined this honor by letter-precisely in order not
to give the Konstads of various countries the opportunity to
spread police gossip.
As to the fairy tales in the reactionary press , which accuse me
of h aving fomented insurrection in Spain, strikes in France and
in Belgium, etc . , I can only shrug my shoulders . If the truth is
told, the initiative for the sedition in Spain belongs to the
political coreligionists of the defendants and their attorney. To be
sure, if it were possible for me to go to Spain to devote myself to
practical work, I would do it immediately. I would gladly devote
all my strength to help the workers of Spain vanquish and
destroy fascism. It is my misfortune to be reduced to being
content with writing articles and giving advice by mail when
individuals or groups wish to ask it of me.
Concretely, what does the fascist l awyer want? We stand before
a tribunal, before an institution created to punish infractions of
the law. Have I broken the law? What law? You all know,
gentlemen of the j ury, that another fascist lawyer, Mr. H . , invited
the courts to open a j udicial inquiry into my activities, whether
literary or terroristic. That complaint has twice been denied.
Public Prosecutor Sund, guardian of the laws of this country,
stated to the press that the m aterial in his possession permits
him neither to accuse me of an infraction of the law nor to open a
j udicial inquiry against me. This statement dates from September
26, five weeks after the Moscow trial, almost a month after my
internment. I must pay homage to the courage and firmness of
Public Prosecutor Sund! His statement expresses distrust regard
ing the charges formulated in Moscow, and condemns the
measures taken against me by the Norwegian government. And
that is enough, I think.
Attorney W: Does the witness recognize this letter and know

who wrote it?
Trotsky: That is a letter I dictated to one of my secretaries , and

it was obviously stolen-excuse the word-by the defendants in
the course of the uninvited visit they paid me. The text shows
that, in answer to a question, I express my opinion on the
confidence that a certain Mr. X., whom I know, may or may n ot
merit. I limit myself to giving advice-this time again.
Attorney W. (ironically): Nothing but advice? Wouldn't there be

. a bit more than advice in it?
Trotsky: You mean, an order? (Sign of assent.) In Nazi parties,

the "chief" makes decisions and gives orders-incontestable
orders , even when the order concerns breaking into someone's
home during the night. The degenerated Communist Internation
al has adopted habits of this kind. Passive obedience and the cult
that is m ade of it create slaves and lackeys, not revolutionists. I
do not direct any institutions; I am not a chieftain anointed by
the Lord . My advice is always extremely circumspect and
relative-it is not easy to weigh all the factors at a distance-and
it is accepted by interested persons in accordance with the
capacity to convince that it bears . The young people who stole
this letter from me were obviously hoping to find in my archives
evidence of plots, revolutions , and other misdeeds. Ignorance in
political matters is a bad counselor. My letters contain nothing
that cannot be found in my articles . My archives complement my
journalistic activities without contradicting them in any way.
Even those who seek to accuse me-
President of the Court: You are accused of nothing. You are

here in the capacity of witness.
Trotsky: I know that very well, Your Honor, but Mr. W-
Attorney W: We make no accusations; we are limiting ourselves

to our defense.
Trotsky: Naturally . But you defend a nocturnal attack against

me by exploiting and enlarging all kinds of slanders against me,
whatever their source may be. I am defending myself against
that "defense. "
President of the Court: That i s your right. You m a y refuse to

answer questions that can be prejudicial to your interests.
Trotsky: There aren't any, Your Honor. I am ready to answer

all questions that anyone would care to ask me, no matter what
side they come from . I am not interested in a closed court. Far
from it! I doubt that in all history a machine can be found for
manufacturing slander comparable in power to that which is in
In Closed Court 461
operation against me. The budget of that agency reaches

millions. Messrs . Fascists and so-called Communists draw their
charges from the s ame source: the GPU. Their collaboration
against me is a fact that can be. o bserved at each step and
especially at this trial. My archives give one of the best
refutations of all the insinuations and slanders directed against
me.
President of the Court: Please be specific.
Trotsky: Permit me to go into detail a little. The archives

concerning my activities since January 1928 are in another
country. The older documents are relatively small in number. But
all the letters I have received and copies of all my answers for the
last nine years (and this is a m atter of thousands of letters) are
available to me. I can at any time whatsoever place these
documents at the disposition of any impartial commission
whatsoever, of any tribunal whatsoever. There are no gaps in this
correspondence, nor are there any blank spaces. It unfolds from
one day to the next, irreproachably complete, and by its
continuous character conveys all my thinking and all my
activity. It leaves n o room for any s lander.
Perhaps you will permit me to give an example borrowed from
an area familiar to the gentlemen of the jury. Imagine a pious
man who all his life strives to live according to the Bible. At a
certain point it happens that his enemies, using false documents
or false testimony, accuse him of engaging clandestinely in the
spreading of antireligious propaganda. What would this ma
ligned man say? " H ere is my family, here are my friends, here is
my library, my correspondence over many years, here is my
entire life. Read all my letters , written to the most diverse people
on the most v aried subjects; question the hundreds of people with
whom I have had connections for m any years, and you will be
convinced that I could not have engaged in an activity contrary
to my entire personality, contrary to my entire moral code." This
argument would be a convincing one for any honest and
reas onable man . (Signs of assent from president of the court and
several jurors.) My situation is analogous to the one I have just
described.
For forty years I h ave defended, by word and deed, the ideas of
revolutionary M arxism. My faithfulness to this philosophy has
been proved, I dare say, by my entire life and more especially by
the situation in which I am placed today. This fidelity to my
beliefs has won me many enemies. In order to weaken the
influence of the ideas I uphold, which are more and more being
confirmed by the events of our era, my enemies seek to besmirch
my character: they would impute individual terrorism to me or,
what is even worse, dealings with the Gestapo. Here, envenomed
malice becomes stupidity. Anyone capable of thinking for
himself, who is familiar with my past and my present, has no
need of any inquiry to dismiss these filthy charges . For those who
wonder or doubt, I proposed that they hear numerous witnesses,
study the most important of the political documents , especially
my archives for that p eriod of my activity which the GPU is
trying to besmirch. The GPU very well knows the importance of
my archives and has no scruples about ways and means of
getting hold of them .
President of the Court: What is the GPU? The gentlemen of the

j ury may not know the meaning of this word.
Trotsky: The GPU is the political police of the USSR. In its day
it was a defensive arm of the people's revolution, but it has
become the defensive arm of the Soviet bureaucracy against the
people. The hatred the bureaucracy b e ars me stems from my
struggle against its monstrous privileges and its criminal
absolutism. And that struggle is the very heart of what is called
"Trotskyism. " In order to render me powerless in the face of
slander, the GPU is trying to get its h ands on my archives,
whether by theft, housebreaking, or assassination.
President of the Court: What proof do you have of this?
Trotsky: Last October 10, for the second or third time, I wrote to
my son in Paris: " I have no doubt that the GPU will do anything,
even the impossible, to seize my archives. I ask you immediately
to place the documents now in Paris with some scientific
institute, perhaps the [Paris branch of the] Dutch Institute of
Social History or, better yet, with some American institution."*
No s ooner did my son entrust p art o f these papers to the
*My son's written deposition, made to the judicial inquiry of November

19, 1936, informed me that he had entrusted part of my archives to the
Institute of Social History before receiving my letter of October 10. My
son had taken this action as a result of my previous letters, in which I
had several times (though less categorically, it is true) expressed the same
fears.
In Closed Court 463
Institute of Social History than this institute was ransacked. The

criminals used a blowtorch to cut through a door, worked right on
the premises most of the night, went through all the shelves, and
took nothing-nothing, not even some money that had been left
there-except 187 pounds of papers belonging to me. Their
method of operation is as revealing as if the head of the GPU had
left his calling card at the scene. All the French papers-except,
of course, l'Humanite, which is the official organ of the GPU
expressed the conviction (either openly or in a veiled fashion)
that this burglary had been carried out at Moscow's orders .
Paying tribute to the GPU's technique, the Paris police declared
that French burglars do not have such sophisticated tools at their
disposal. By accident, the Paris GPU agents were in too great a
hurry: the first shipment of papers to the Institute of Social
History included only about one-twentieth of the documents in
Paris, and these were mostly old newspapers of historical interest
only. Fortun ately, the thieves did not get more than a few letters.
But they won't stop there. I expect other, more energetic attacks,
perhaps even here in Norway. In any case, I should like to call
the attention of the j udges to the fact that the GPU broke into
and ransacked places containing my archives a short time after I
named the In s titute of Social History in a letter that passed
through the Passport Bureau. Am I not right in supposing that
the GPU has agents in the Norwegian bureaus that control my
correspondence? If that is the case, the control becomes direct
complicity with the burglars . The Paris exploit of Stalin's agents
has for the first time suggested to me that these gentlemen
(gesturing toward the defendants) might also belong to the
GPU . . .
President of the Court: On what do you base this suspicion?
Trotsky: I have only formulated a hypothesis . I have wondered

more than once: Who suggested the idea of r aiding my house to
these young men? Who supplied them with a highly technical
device, used by the army, to m onitor my telephone conversations?
Norwegian Nazis are still, as the recent elections have proved,
only an insignificant group . At first I thought that it was the
Gestapo looking for something, that the Gestapo was trying, by
this means, to locate my p olitical friends in Germany. I still
consider its involvement in this affair almost a certainty.
President of the Court: And what are your reasons?

Trotsky: S everal weeks before the raid, Messrs. Fascists

frequently visited our yard and even our apartment, posing as
possible purchasers of the house. The attitude of these purchasers
attracted my attention several times: meeting me in the yard or in
the house, they made believe that they didn't see me, not having
the nerve to greet me. Generally speaking, the courage of these
young people did not measure up to their evil designs, and that is
what made them abandon their task in the face of resistance
from a brave young girl, Hjordis Knudsen. A few days before the
raid, a stranger in Tyrolean costume appeared in our yard and,
upon seeing me, made an about-face. Asked what he was looking
for, he anwered stupidly: "I want to buy some bread," and
presented himself as an A ustrian tourist. But an Austrian who
happened to be our guest, h aving politely gotten rid of him, later
told me, "That so-called Austrian speaks with a North German
accent." I have no doubt, gentlemen of the jury, that this
s uspicious-looking tourist played a role in m aking preparations
for the raid.
The principal defendant, R.H: He was a tourist from Mecklen

burg, wearing Tyrolean breeches . He was no more than eighteen
years old. He had nothing to do with our plan. We ran into him
by chance at the hotel . . .
Trotsky: Very well . The defendant acknowledges having had

contact with the man from Mecklenburg who made believe, we
don't know why, that he was an Austrian. As for his age, this
tourist was not under twenty-three. There was no reason for him
to come to our house to buy bread when there are bakeries. You
met him by chance at the hotel? I don't believe that. I say that
the only true words the defendant has spoken are "Tyrolean
breeches." Fascists , especially the German fascists, have suffi
ciently demonstrated their h atred for me. When the French press
conducted its campaign against me, it received its most
important material from Germany. When the Gestapo discovered,
in Berlin , a packet of my oid letters, predating the victory of
Nazism, Goebbels had the whole country plastered with posters
denouncing niy criminal activities. My political friends in
Germany have been sentenced to dozens of years in j ail.
Attorney W: How long ago was this?
Trotsky: They are arrested and sentenced continually, and

nothing has changed in this respect in the last few months. From
In Closed Court 465
my very first years of exile, I had pointed out many a time in my

writings that the Communist International's policy in Germany
would lead to a Nazi victory. The too-famous "third period"
theory was then in fashion. Stalin had delivered himself of this
formulation: "Social Democracy and fascism are twins, not
antipodes." Of the two, the Social Democracy was considered the
more dangerous enemy. In their struggle against the Social
Democracy, the Stalinists finally arrived at supporting Hitler (at
the time of the referendum in Prussia).461 The entire policy of the
Third International was nothing but a succession of crimes. I
kept calling for a united front with the Social Democracy ,
creation of workers' militias, serious, not theatrical, action
against the armed bands of reaction. The Hitler movement could
very well have been checkmated in 1929-32. But this would have
necessitated a policy of revolutionary defense, not bureaucratic
stupidity and empty bluster. The Nazis very closely followed the
dissension within the working class and clearly realized the
d anger that a strong united front policy would confront them
with. It is easily understandable, in this connection, that the
Gestapo might attempt to lay its hands, with the aid of its
political friends in Norway, on my correspondence.
But another explanation is also possible. The GPU, in
preparation for the Moscow trial, would not lack interest in my
archives. To organize a raid with "Communists" might have
meant coming out in the open too much. It was more convenient
to use fascists . Moreover, the GPU has its agents in the Gestapo,
just as the Gestapo has its agents in the GPU. Either one or the
other could have used these young people to carry out their plans.
Defendant R.H. (heatedly); We weren't in contact with either

the Gestapo or the GPU!
Trotsky; I am not stating that the accused knew who was

making use of them. Fascist youth are fated to serve as cannon
fodder for forces they know nothing about.
Attorney W. (holding up issues of the Biulleten Oppozitsii

published in Russian); Is the witness editor of this publication?
Trotsky; Editor in the formal sense, no. But the main

contributor. At any rate, I assume complete responsibility for this
publication.
Attorney W. (after the court had heard, at his request, various

excerpts from the Biulleten containing sharp criticism of the

So viet bureaucracy): I draw the attention of the court to the fact
that the witness wrote these articles during his stay in Norway,
thus trying to bring about the downfall of the established
government of a country with which Norway has friendly
relations.
Trotsky: I note with interest the fact that Norwegian fascists

defend Stalin's regime against me. They also, together with the
director of the Passport Bureau, reproach me with having
criticized the policy of Leon Blum in France. Obviously, they
defend all existing governments except their own, here reserving
for themselves the right of forceful overthrow. Their attack on me
might seem a rather insignificant episode, if it is considered in
isolation. But if we reflect on it a little, we can see in it the first
skirmish of a civil war. (A ttorney W. lifts his arms with an
expression of demonstrative stupefaction.) Oh, I very well know
that all this is done in the name of "order." General Franco
mutinied in the name of "order. " Hitler is preparing a world war
to save "order" against Bolshevism. Fascists save order by
instituting bloody disorder. As a start, the Norwegian fascists
tried to disorder my papers . But that is because they are still too
weak to commit other crimes .
Attorney W: Is the Biulleten banned in Russia?
Trotsky: Obviously.
Attorney W: Nevertheless , it says its ideas have numerous

supporters in the USSR. Thus the witness has been engaged,
during his stay in Norway, in illegally sending the Biulleten to
Russia.
Trotsky: I am not at all eIlgaged in that, personally. H owever, I

do not doubt that the Biulleten and its ideas do reach the USSR.
How? In the most varied w ays. There are always hundreds, if not
thousands , of Soviet citizens abroad-diplomats , commercial
representatives, sailors , businessmen, technicians, students,
artists , athletes . A number of them read the Biulleten, secretly to
be sure, but more willingly than they read the official Soviet
press. I have even heard that Litvinov always carries the latest
issue of the Biulleten in his pocket. However, I wouldn't swear to
this under oath, inasmuch as I have no desire to make trouble for
this Soviet diplomat. (Smiles in the courtroom.) The dignitaries of
With Erwin Wolf at the Oslo court, August 28, 1936.
the Kremlin are the most faithful subscribers to the Biulleten,

with which they have often polemicized in their speeches.
Whether or not they are happy about it is another matter.
Finding these speeches in the press, Soviet citizens try to read
between the lines. All in all, a small thing, but still something.
I take this opportunity to observe that the Biulleten has been
appearing for eight years, a period of time that I spent principally
in Turkey and France. Until 1 933, the Biulleten appeared in
Germany; Hitler banned it when he came to power. At the
moment, the Biulleten appears in France, in conformity with
French laws governing the press. The Turkish government,
although maintaining the most friendly relations with the
Kremlin, never attempted to interfere with my literary activity.
The honor of starting this belongs, after Hitler, to the Norwegian
fascists and then to the Norwegian government.
Attorney W. (handing the witness no. 48 of the Biulleten): Is the

witness the author of the unsigned editorial in this issue ["On the
Soviet Section of the Fourth International"]?
Trotsky: Is the attorney for the defense interested in this

article, too? I am indeed obliged to point out that there is a rather
striking coincidence here.The chief of the Norwegian police, Mr.
Askvig, who is present here, came to Sundby (where I am
interned) a few weeks ago to ask me this same question
concerning the editorial in the February 1 936 Biulleten-on
behalf of the Passport Bureau. I asked him if Mr. Konstad were
going to hold a judicial inquiry.If so, on what grounds? By virtue
of what law? I found Mr.Konstad's question insolent and refused
to answer it. The very same issue of the Biulleten is now in the
hands of Attorney W .. . .
President o f the Court: Attorney for the defense has the right to
know all the material connected with the preliminary investiga
tion.
Trotsky: I know that very well. But who introduced this issue
of the Biulleten into the preliminary investigation?
Public prosecutor: The defense requested that it be added to the

record.I was opposed, since I did not see any connection between
this document and the case.
Trotsky: So, gentlemen of the jury and judges, the director of

In Closed Court 469
the Passport Bureau illegally tried to get from me, using the
police as intermediary, information that might be useful in the
defense of those who broke into my home. Isn't that scandalous?
And it is to this gentleman that the "Socialist" government
entrusts the surveillance of my correspondence!
As for the article in question, I do not have the slightest reason
to deny before this court that I wrote it. Besides, it has been
published under my signature in various papers in Europe and
America. The entire article deals with the persecution of
Trotskyists in the USSR.I have written dozens of articles of this
nature. It would appear that the attorney for the defense does not
want to permit me, come what may, to criticize the Stalinist
police. I am not surprised: The fascists steal my papers in
Norway, the GPU steals them in Paris, and this unity of action
engenders a solidarity of interest.
(After reading excerpts from the offending article, Attorney W.

shows the witness a book published in Paris in 1936-Terrorism
and Communism, by Leon Trotsky.)
Attorney W: Is the preface to this book, dated 1936 and

consequently written in Norway, the work of the witness?
Trotsky: The question is unnecessary. The preface is signed

and dated. The book was written in 1919, and it then appeared in
several languages. The origin of this work is as follows. The
theoretician of the Second International, Karl Kautsky, had
written a book against the "terrorism" of the Bolsheviks.I went
to the defense of my party. It does not, of course, deal with
individual terrorism, which, as Marxists, we have always
rejected, but with revolutionary action by the masses.I do not
know if this book is criminal or not from the point of view of the
Passport Bureau, but the present minister of justice, the president
of the council, and other members of the Norwegian government
belonged to the Communist International in precisely the same
period in which this work was published.They have certainly all
read it. To know how much of it they retained or how much of it
they understood would be another matter ...
(At the request of Attorney W., several passages from the

preface to the book are read.)
Trotsky: One can see that the defendants made a mistake in

stealing my papers-my books express the revolutionary nature
of my program at greater length and with far greater force. Even

the Norwegian Passport Bureau's medicine will not cure me of
my subversive ideas.
Attorney W. (offering in evidence another book by Leon

Trotsky, The Revolution Betrayed): Did the witness write this
book during his stay in Norway?
Trotsky: Yes, and I had the good fortune to finish it and

forward two manuscripts for translation, one to France and one
to the United States, before being interned. The other copies of
the manuscript fell into the hands of the Passport Bureau, which,
with the assistance of scholars and diplomats, spent two months
wondering if I had written a scientific or a political work. Only
since receiving copies of the French edition has Mr. Konstad
realized that his enlightened efforts were in vain-not, however,
without causing me considerable mental anguish and material
loss. Nevertheless, it never occurred to anyone, other than in
Norway, to protest the publication of this work. On the contrary I
have been able to ascertain, with satisfaction, that it has been
very well received by the French public.
Attorney W: By "well received" does the witness mean that it

has been widely read?
Trotsky: Not merely that. I am thinking of the articles this

book has given rise to in all kinds of newspapers, of the most
diverse tendencies. Naturally, my political conclusions are
unsparingly condemned by most of the publications. But almost
all the critics call my book to the attention of the reading public.
Mr. Caillaux, former president of the [French] Council [of
Deputies], who beyond any doubt is no political friend of mine,
was one of the first to express himself to that effect. I could cite
many other opinions. But isn't it astonishing, isn't it laughable,
gentlemen of the jury, that I am in some way obliged to defend
my right, before a Norwegian court, to publish books in France?
The Norwegian government has placed itself in a position from
which it can no longer extricate itself with dignity.
(At the invitation of the attorney, the witness translates from

French to German a few passages of the book, in which the
ine vitable overthrow of the Bonapartist bureaucracy by the
toiling masses of the USSR is discussed.)
In Closed Court 471
A ttorney W: I emphasize that these pages were written in

Norway.
Trotsky: And I emphasize that the Soviet oligarchy finds

vigilant defenders-disinterested ones, I hope-in the Norwegian
fascists. In any event, Stalin and Mr. Quisling have collaborated
to have me interned.462
The Moscow Trial
(After a half-hour recess, Defense A ttorney W. asks the witness

a question about the trial of the sixteen, an account of which he
reads to the court in German. The prosecuting attorney o bjects to
the question as irrelevant, all the more so since the fascist raid on
Trotsky's home had taken place before the Moscow trial had been
announced. The president of the court sustains the o bjection.
Trotsky: I strongly urge the court to give the defense attorney

the opportunity to ask me any question he considers of use to
him, especially about the Moscow trial. It is true that that trial
took place after the attack on my home.But it is possible that the
attack had been only an episode in preparing the trial of the
sixteen, in the same way that the theft of my papers in Paris is
certainly part of the preparation of a new trial. The court,
moreover, has an interest in knowing the moral and political
character of a witness.
President of the Court: Since the witness is disposed to answer

questions, the court does not object.
A ttorney W: What can the witness say about the causes of that
trial?
Trotsky: The question is phrased too vaguely. We stand before

a bar of justice.The attorney for the defense is a jurist.We are not
dealing with "causes." The question should have been formulated
with greater precision: Are the charges against me in the Moscow
trial true? I answer: No, they are false. They contain not one word
of truth! And it is not a matter of legal or judicial error but of
deliberate frame-up.The GPU has been preparing this trial for at
least ten years.That is, they began its preparation well before the
Kirov assassination, which was only an "accident" in the course
of this preparation. I had no more part in Kirov's assassination
than anyone in this room. No more, gentlemen of the jury. The
chief organizer of Moscow's legal forgery, this greatest political

crime of our tim e and perhaps of all time, is Stalin. (All listen
with complete attention.) I am fully conscious of the gravity of
my words and of the reponsibility I assume. I weigh each word,
gentlemen of th e j ury.
One continually finds newspaper articles that reduce the
m atter to personal enmity between Stalin and Trotsky. "Struggle
for power," "rivalry ," they say. These explanations must be
rej ected as superficial, foolish , and even absurd. So-called
Trotskyists, by ten s of thousan d s , have been harshly persecuted
in the USSR during the past thirteen years , snatched from their
work and their families, deprived of their homes and of
everything else, often of their lives-would this be on account of
personal rivalry between Stalin and Trotsky? The Re volution
Betrayed, the book that has so upset the attorney for the defense,
was written before the Moscow trial; it gives , as the press
acknowledges , the true political and historical explanation of
that trial. I shall be able to speak of it here only very briefly. I
can understand the embarrassment that an outsider, a jurist
especially, would feel in face of the Moscow trial. It is , of course,
impossible to believe that the entire Bolshevik Old Guard became
fascist. Even the course that the trial took seems like a
nightmare. What need the Soviet government had for this
p hantasm agoria and how it got the defendants to accuse
themselves falsely is also not understood.
Permit me to say that it is not possible to approach the Moscow
trial with the ordinary criteria of common sense. Common sense
is based on the everyday experience of normal , peaceful life. Now,
Russia has had a social revolution of immense breadth. It is still
very far from having acquired a new internal equilibrium . Social
relations as well as ideas are still extremely volatile in that
country. The first thing to be taken into consideration is the
fundamental contradiction that is today tearing Soviet society
a part.
The aim of the revolution was to establish a society without
classes , that is , without the privileged few and the wretched
many. A society of this kind would have no need of the coercive
power of the state. The founders of the regime assumed that all
social functions would be accomplished by the citizens them
selves, without a professional bureaucracy dominating the
citizenry as a whole. Various historical cause s , of which I shall
not speak here, have acted to make the real structure of Soviet
society today in flagrant contradiction with this ideal . An
absolutist bureaucracy has placed itself above the people. It has
In Closed Court 473
the power, and it controls the wealth of the country. It enjoys

unheard-of privileges , privileges that increase each year.
The position of the caste in power is b asically a false one. This
caste is obliged to hide its privileges , to lie to the people, to use
Communist formulations to j ustify relationships and facts that
have nothing to do with communism. The bureaucratic apparatus
permits no one to call things by their right name. On the contrary
it requires that in all circumstances conventional "Communist"
language b e used-which serves to camouflage the truth. The
traditions of the party and its fundamental documents are in
absolute contradiction with the existing reality. The ruling
oligarchy consequently obliges historians , economists , sociolo
gists, professors , teachers, propagandists , j udges, to interpret the
documents and the reality, the past and the present, in such a
way as to make them agree, at least in appearance. The
obligatory lie permeates the entire official ideology. People think
one thing and write and say another. The gap between the word
and the reality grows continually; the most s acred formulations
have to be revised each year. Examine the various editions of the
same book, an encyclopedia, for example, and you will see that
each new edition contains a different evaluation of the s ame
people, the s ame facts-sometimes more and more laudatory,
sometimes more and more abusive. Under the knout of the
bureaucracy, thousands of men systematically accomplish a work
of "scientific" falsification . The slightest hint of criticism or of
objection , the slightest dis a greement, are treated as the worst of
cnmes .
Without fear of exaggeration, it can be s aid that the bureaucra

cy has saturated the entire political atmosphere of the USSR with
the spirit of the Inquisition. Lies, slander, forgery are not
occasional w eapons against political adversaries but are organi
cally derived from the bureaucracy's false position in Soviet
society. The press of the Communist International, like the
newspaper you know, is only a pale reflection of the Soviet press
in this respect. But reality makes itself felt at every step, exposes
the official lie, and verifies the criticism of the Opposition
whence the necessity for the bureaucracy to h ave recours e to ever
stronger methods for proving its infallibility. They began by
relieving opponents of their functions, went on to deport them to
outlying area s , and ended by refusing them work of any kind.
They were the objects of increasingly venomous vilification.
Since the public was weary of polemical articles, in which they no
longer placed any credence, it became necessary to stage
sensational trials. There was really nothing left to do but to

accuse opponents of crimes, not against the privileges of the new
aristocracy, but against the interests of the people. At each new
stage, accusations of this kind took on a more monstrous
character. Such is the political atmosphere, such is the social
psychology, that have made possible the weird spectacle of the
Moscow trial. At Zinoviev's trial, the bureaucracy reached its
highest-or rather, fell to its lowest-point.
If in a general way this trial was a long time in preparation, a
good many things lead one to believe that it was staged a few
weeks, perhaps even a few months, sooner than the producers
wished. The impression created by the raid of these gentlemen
here, the defendants, ran counter to Moscow's plans. The press
everywhere was talking, and not without reason, about the
Norwegian Nazis' connections with the Gestapo. A trial was to
take place here, in the course of which would be revealed, in all
their gravity, the antagonisms between me and the fascists. At
all costs it was necessary to erase the impression created by an
unfortunate venture. In all likelihood Stalin demanded of the
GPU that the Moscow trial be hastened.Official data show that
the most important "confessions" were obtained from the accused
during the last week of the preliminary inquiry, on the very eve of
the trial, between the seventh and the fourteenth of August. It
was difficult in such great haste to make the depositions agree
with each other and with the facts. Besides, the stage directors
were depending on the confessions of the accused to fill the holes
in the charges. From the moment that the sixteen defendants
confessed that they were guilty of the Kirov assassination or of
plotting other murders-some even adding that they had been
connected with the Gestapo-why should the prosecutor bother
with superfluous proofs or even bother to get rid of flagrant
contradictions, anachronisms, absurdities? The absence of
accountability to the people lessens attention to detail; not being
responsible to an electorate engenders carelessness. Prosecutor
Vyshinsky is not only without scruple; he is also devoid of any
talent. He substitutes invective for evidence. His statement of
charges, hi;s demand for punishment, heap contradiction upon
contradiction.
I cannot, as is self-evident, analyze or even enumerate these
contradictions at this time. My older son, Leon Sedov, whom the
Borgia of Moscow has dragged into this case to get at me
(doubtless he thought it would be harder for my son to establish
alibis than for me), recently published a Red Book in Paris,
In Closed Court 475
devoted to the Moscow trial. The 120 pages of this document fully
bring out the total inconsistency of the charges from the
standpoint of facts, psychology, and politics. My son has not,
however, been able to put to advantage onetenth of the
documents at my disposition (letters, articles, testimony of
witnesses , personal souvenirs ) .Before any tribunal whatsoever,
Moscow's accusers would have been unmasked as falsifiers who
stop at nothing when it comes to defending the interests of the
new privileged caste.
Some Western jurists have been found (in England, Mr. Pritt; in
France, Mr. Rosenmark) who, basing themselves on the "full"
confessions of the accused, would present the GPU with a
certificate of morality. These legal defenders of Stalin will some
day regret their hasty and ill-considered zeal; truth, battling its
way through every obstacle, will sweep away many a reputation.
The Pritts deceive the public by presenting things as though
sixteen people, suspected of belonging to a gang of criminals , had
wound up by handing over confessions that paint, despite the
absence of any material evidence, a convincing picture of
preparations for the Kirov assassination and other crimes. In
reality the defendants and the groups of defendants in the trial of
the sixteen were not connected with each other, either by the
Kirov case or by any other case. The official documents tell us
that, in the aftermath of the Kirov assassination, at first 104
unknown "White Guards" (among whom there were not a few
Oppositionists) were shot, after which fourteen people, falsely
accused or accused by reason of association with the Nikolaev
group which had killed Kirov, were also shot.Although these
fourteen had made "complete confessions , " not one of them had
named a single future defendant in the trial of the sixteen.The
Zinoviev-Kamenev affair is Stalin's enterprise, constructed
without relation to the earlier Kirov trial. The "confessions" of
the sixteen, obtained in several successive stages, in no way give
a picture of terrorist activity carried on by the particular person
in question.On the contrary one sees the accused, guided by the
accusers, carefully evade concrete questions of time and place.I
have just been shown the official report of the Moscow trial. Why ,
this little book really indicts the perpetrators of the judicial fraud!
For page after page the defendants, prey to a kind of hysteria,
denounce their own crimes without being able to say anything
definite about them! They have nothing to say about them,
gentlemen of the jury, because they have not committed any
crimes. Their confessions were to have enabled the clique in
power to put an end to its opponents-including me, its "enemy

number one."
"But why, for what reasons, would the defendants charge
themselves with crimes they never committed and thus rush
toward their own destruction?" ask the GPU's advocates. A
profoundly dishonest objection. Did the accused make these
confessions of their own accord, of their own free will?
Over many years, the vise that held them had been made
tighter and tighter, so that in the end they could have no hope for
salvation other than absolute submission, total prostration,
hysterical servility in the presence of the executioner, whose
every word and gesture they henceforth repeated. The human
nervous system has a limited capacity for resistance.The GPU
had no need of physical torture or of special drugs to bring the
accused to the point where they could no longer look for
deliverance, in an intolerable situation, except through unlimited
compliance with their own vilification. Humiliation, suffering,
mental torture over a ten-year period (for some, thirteen years),
inflicted on the most prominent of the accused and their families,
were all that was needed to bring them to this point.
The nightmare of the "confessions" can only be explained if

one does not for a single instant lose sight of the fact that these
defendants had many a time through the years abjured their
beliefs: before the party's control commission; before meetings;
again before commissions; and finally before a tribunal. Each
time it was required, they admitted to exactly what they were
obliged to admit to. At first this was on questions of program.
The Opposition had long fought for the industrialization and
collectivization of agriculture.Reduced to taking the road pointed
out by the Opposition after having resisted it for a long time, the
bureaucracy accused the Opposition of having stood in the way of
industrialization and collectivization! That's the Stalinist method
in a nutshell! It was then demanded of Oppositionists who
wanted to get back into the party that they acknowledge having
committed an "error" that was really committed by the bureau
cracy.The opportunity for this jesuitical maneuver stemmed from
the fact that the Opposition's ideas were known to only a few tens
or hundreds of thousands of people, especially in the upper layers
of society; the masses of the people remained in ignorance of
these ideas because the bureaucracy unrelentingly prevented the
spread of our writings.
Long and painful haggling went on behind the scenes between
In Closed Court 477
repentant Oppositionists and functionaries of the control commis

sions, which are really organs of the GPU: What mistake should
be acknowledged and in what way? The jesuits of the control
commissions always won out in the end. The party leaders knew
perfectly well that these acts of abjuration did not have the
slightest moral value and that their only object was to affirm to
the masses the dogma of the infallibility of the chiefs. Later on
the bureaucracy, in struggling for absolute power, exacted new
and even more humiliating renunciations from the same
opponent, who had long since repented (in other words,
renounced all right to criticize). At the first sign of resistance, the
Inquisitor responded: "So, all your previous statements of
repentance have been insincere! You don't want to help the party
fight its enemies! You put yourself back on the other side of the
barricades!"
What could the capitulators-these former Oppositionists who
had already engaged in self-vilification-do now? Resist? Too
late.They were trapped.Return to the Opposition was impossible
for them-the Opposition would not have trusted them..Moreover,
they no longer had any will for politics. Crushed by their previous
self-denunciation, always in danger, threatened anew with
reprisals to their families, under police blackmail, they bent their
knee at every stage, sinking lower and lower.
At the first [1 935] Zinoviev-Kamenev trial, the defendants, after
having undergone the worst mental tortures, agreed to admit that
the moral responsibility for terrorist acts devolved on them, in
their capacity as ex-Oppositionists. That admission was soon to
serve the GPU as a point of departure for new blackmail.The
official press-at the signal from Stalin-from then on demanded
the death sentence. The GPU organized demonstrations before
the court where the cry was "Death to the assassins!" The
condemned are thus prepared for new confessions. Kamenev
resisted longer than Zinoviev. For him they staged, on July 27,
1 935, a new trial, in closed court, so that he could be given to
understand that his sole hope of salvation-rather the shadow of
a hope-lay in absolute cooperation with those in power. Cut off
from the outside world, without inner security, vulnerable, with
nothing before him, without a ray of light, Kamenev was
shattered. Those defendants who continued, despite nameless
tortures, to defend their dignity, those the GPU shot without trial
and without publicity. In this way Stalin "selected" and groomed
the defendants in the recent Moscow trial. That is the reality,
gentlemen of the jury.All the rest is but lie and hoax.
"Why should these things happen?" you will ask. To smother

all opposition, all criticism, to demoralize and smear anyone who
resists the bureaucracy or who limits himself to not singing its
praises. And it is not only here that this diabolical work has been
aimed at me. But on this point I must again go back to an earlier
date.
In 1 928, after the first mass arrests in the party, the
bureaucracy did not dare even dream of physically suppressing
the Opposition. It could not, however, sit back and wait for the
Opposition to capitulate. I kept directing the struggle from my
place of deportation [Alma Ata]. Finally the clique in power could
find no other solution but to banish me completely, to expel me
from the country. At the meeting of the Political Bureau (a report
of which I received through friends and which I immediately
published), Stalin had said: "In a foreign country, Trotsky will be
isolated. He will have to write for the bourgeois press, and that
will give us a chance to smear him. The Social Democracy will go
to his defense, and we will discredit him in the eyes of the world
proletariat. If he makes any revelations, we will denounce him as
a traitor."
That cunning calculation lacked perspicacity. Stalin did not
take into consideration the strength and the significance of ideas.
From abroad I published works that served to educate the youth.
Groups sharing my ideas were organized in every country.
Publications sprang up, based on the program I defend. An
international conference under the aegis of the Fourth Interna
tional was recently held. Under the blows of the enemy, this
movement continues to grow-while the Communist Internation
al is in the grip of confusion and disarray. Now, without
international authority, Stalin cannot retain command of the
bureaucracy, and consequently his power over the people. The
growth of the Fourth International, news of which more and
more reaches into the Soviet Union, constitutes a serious danger
for him. In short, the ruling clique fears more than anything else
the still living traditions of the October Revolution, inexorably
hostile to the new privileged caste.
All this explains why Stalin and his group never for an instant
cease their struggle against me personally. Every capitulation
made in the past thirteen years must invariably contain some
statement against me. Tens of thousands of individual and
collective statements of this kind can be counted. Without
condemning Trotsky, without vilifying Trotsky, no ex-Op
positionist can think of getting himself back into the party, or
even of getting a crust of bread. From year to year the
In Closed Court 479
renunciations become more humiliating, the abuse against

Trotsky more gross, the slanders more mendacious. Future
defendants receive this training, as do their judges. It is by
degrees that they arrive at their present demoralization. The
organizer of this, the man responsible for this demoralization
and again I deplore the fact that I have to declare this in closed
court-is Stalin. The recent trial did not come out of a clear blue
sky. It consummates a long series of false renunciations directed
against me. When Stalin understood the error he had committed
in banishing me, he tried to repair it in his own unique way, with
typical methods. The judicial frame-up that has stunned world
opinion was in reality only an inevitable link in a long chain of
actions. It was foreseen and publicly announced.
The recent trial was based on a charge of terrorism.As far as I

am concerned, gentlemen of the jury, I would not stop at
advocating and applying individual terrorism if I could believe it
capable of contributing to the liberation of humanity. My enemies
have often indicted and persecuted me for the ideas I express;
that is what the Norwegian govemment has just done.But to this
day no one has accused me of hiding my ideas. If I invariably
take a stand against individual terrorism-and this stand dates
not from yesterday but from the very first days of my
revolutionary activity-it is because I consider it not only
ineffective but, even worse, fatal to the working class movement.
Two terrorist parties, known the world over, were active in
Russia, People's Will [the NarodniksJ and the Social Revolution
ary Party.We Russian Marxists were organized as a mass party
in the course of an intransigent struggle against individual
terrorism. Our principal argument was that this method disor
ganizes the revolutionary party much more than it does the
government. It is not without reason that the Bonapartist
bureaucracy of the USSR avidly seeks out this kind of crime, and
even invents it, in order later to impute it to their political
adversaries.The assassination of Kirov could not for one moment
shake the absolute power of the bureaucracy.On the contrary, it
gave them the hoped-for opportunity to exterminate, by the
hundreds, people they feared, to cover their adversaries with mud,
and to sow confusion in the minds of the workers.The results of
Nikolaev's adventure have completely confirmed-and could it be
otherwise?-the traditional Marxist condemnation of terrorism,
to which I have remained faithful for forty years and which I
would not dream of changing today.
If terrorist tendencies are appearing in certain sections of
Soviet youth , it is not a result of the Opposition's political activity

but, on the contrary, of the Opposition's defeat, of the smothering
of all thought, all protest-such tendencies are a result of anger
and desperation _ The GPU eagerly seizes upon every desire for
terrorism, cultivates it, soon creates a kind of clandestine
organization in which the unfortunate terrorist is surrounded on
all sides with agents provocateurs _ This was so in Nikolaev's
case. Published official documents undeniably bring out, if one
takes the trouble to examine them carefully, that Yagoda, Stalin,
and Kirov himself were informed that an assassination attempt
was in preparation in Leningrad. All that the GPU had to do was
implicate leaders of the Opposition , then discover the plot on the
eve of the act and reap the political profit from it. Was Nikolaev
himself a member of the GPU? Did he wear two hats? I really
don't know. In any case, he pulled the trigger before Stalin and
Yagoda had the time to implicate their political adversaries in the
plot. From the early months of 1935 on, basing myself only on the
official documents, I unmasked the police provocation in the
Kirov affair. (I published a pamphlet entitled The ' Stalinist
Burea ucracy and the Assassination of Kiro v.) I wrote that the
failure of this intrigue, which cost Kirov's life, far from stopping
Stalin would oblige him to stage another and larger affair:'iOne
oi' the
didn't need the gift of prophecy to foresee this : a knowledge
circumstances, the facts, and the people was enough .
As I have indicated, the GPU was able to derive only one
benefit from the Kirov assassination: the confession by all the
accused-with a revol ver at their heads-that the moral responsi
bility for Nikolaev's crime rested with them. Neither the accused,
nor public opinion, nor the j udges were prepared for anything
more. But all was not lost. Stalin was determined to make capital
of Kirov' s corpse. The GPU began periodically to dig up the
corpse for new charges, new confession s , new executions. After a
new eighteen-month psychological preparation, during which all
the most important defendants remained in j ail, the GPU
presented them with its ultimatum: they would have to help in
tracing the charge of terrorism all the way back to Trotsky. At
the preliminary inquiry preceding the trial of the sixteen, th e
question could have been posed only as follows:
"You are no longer dangerous to us," Stalin's agents said, in
essence, to Zinoviev, Kamenev, and the other prisoners. "You
know that. But Trotsky hasn't given up. He's fighting us on the
international leveL The war is getting closer" (because Bonapart
ists always play on patriotic feelings). " We must make an end of
In Closed Court 481
Trotsky at any price-and without delay. Compromise him .

Implicate him in the terrorist plots . Link him with the Gestapo. "
" But, " the perpetual defendants would have repli ed, "nobody
will believe us. We will only succeed in compromising ourselves
without striking at him . . . . "
The haggling must have followed that line. Several candidates
who would not go along with the job were shot without trial, so
that the others might understand that they had no choice.

"Whether they believe you or not , " the examining magistrates
must have replied, "is none of your business . Your business is to
prove that all your previous statements were not j ust hypocrisy,
that you are sincerely devoted to the p arty" (that is, to the ruling
caste) "and ready to m ake any sacrifice for it."
If the desire to be honest seized them-and j ailed as they were,
they had no reason to have scruples-the examining magistrates
could have added:
"Those in the know won't believe you? That's not importan t.
Mighty few of them will decide to protest! The fascists ' lies can
only be useful to us. The democrats ? They will keep their mouths
shut. The French and Czechoslovakian democracies will be silent
as the grave-for patriotic considerations . Leon Blum is depend
ent on the Communists, who will do anything we tell them to do.
The 'Friends of the Soviet Union'? They will swallow anything if
only not to admit how blind they've been. The international
bourgeoisie, which recognizes in Trotsky the theoretician of
permanent revolution, cannot be interested in supporting him
against us. The press of the Fourth International is still weak.
The masses will thus h e ar only what we say, and not Trotsky's
answers . "
Such were Stalin's calculations, and they were not far wrong.
The defendants finally capitulated once again and consented to
play the tragic and dishonorable roles forced on them.
They did not all agree to confess to everything demanded of
them. The very gradation of the confessions attests to the kind of
desperate struggles that took place behind the scene on the eve of
the trial. I shall omit here the youthful suspects I was supposed to
have sent into Russia-whom I have never heard of before.
Among the old revolutionists, not one of them admitted to having
been connected with the Gestapo: the GPU did not s ucceed in
getting them to debase themselves to that point. Smirnov and
Goltsman denied p articipating in any terrorist activities . But all
the defendants, without exception, testified that Trotsky had,
from abroad, addressed clandestine appeals for terrorism, had
given instructions for terrorist activity, and had even sent

terrorists into the USSR. My participation in terrorism is thus a
common denominator of all the confessions. That was the
minimum for which the GPU would settle. The only way its
victims could save their lives was to give the GPU this minimum.
The real aim of this entire frame up is thus revealed to us. The
secretary of the Second International, Friedrich Adler, my oId
mortal enemy, wrote "The practical aim of this whole enterprise
constitutes the most ignoble chapter of the trial. It is a question of
depriving Trotsky of asylum in Norway, of organizing a veritable
manhunt against him, of making it impossible for him to exist
any place on earth."
Let us consider, gentlemen of the jury, the common denomina

tor of the confessions as it appears in the depositions of the
defendant Goltsman, principal witness against me and my son.
In November 1 932, Goltsman arrived in Copenhagen, according
to his story, to see me. In the lobby of the Hotel Bristol, he met
my son, who brought him to me. In the course of a long
conversation, I revealed the terrorist program to him. This is
perhaps the sole testimony to contain particulars of time and
place. And since Goltsman obstinately refuses to admit any
liaison whatsoever with the Gestapo or any participation in
terrorist activities, his depositions are supposed to appear the
most trustworthy to us.
What is the truth of this? Goltsman never paid me a visit, in
Copenhagen or anyplace else. My son did not come to Copenha
gen when I was there nor, as a matter of fact, has he ever been in
Denmark. Finally, the Hotel Bristol, where Goltsman was
supposed to have met my son in 1 932, had been demolished in
1 9 1 7! A fortunate conjunction of circumstances (visas, witnesses,
telegrams, etc.) permits all the material elements of the story of
the defendant most miserly with his confessions to be reduced to
nothing. Now, Goltsman is no exception. The other confessions
are cut of the same cloth. My son's Red Book has unmasked them
all. Other revelations will follow. For my part, I could have long
ago submitted to the press, to public opinion, to an impartial
commission of inquiry, or to an independent court, facts,
documents, testimony of witnesses, political and psychological
considerations, thoroughly refuting the Moscow amalgam. But
my hands are tied . The Norwegian government has made a trap
of the right of asylum. At the very moment the GPU is heaping
extraordinarily infamous charges on my head, the government of
In Closed Court 483
this country places me under lock and key and cuts me off from
communicating with the outside world.
Here I must relate an incident that is not very important but
that can, nevertheless, explain my present situation. Last
summer, a few weeks before the Moscow trial, the Norwegian
minister of foreign affairs , Mr. Koht, was invited to Moscow,
where he received an exceptionally cordial welcome. I spoke of
this to my host, the j o urnalist Konrad Knudsen, whom you have
already heard as a witness here. Despite profound differences in
our p olitical viewpoints, we are on very friendly terms. Other
than to exchange some piece of news, we did not talk about
politics , avoiding all discussions of principles.
"Do you know, " I asked him in a half-j oking voice, " why Koht
is being so well received in Moscow?
" Why?"
"They are bargaining over my head . "
" H o w d o you kno w that?"
"Moscow is hinting to Mr. Koht-or s aying outright-'We will
charter your ship s , we will buy your herrings, but on one
condition: that you sell us Trotsky. ' ' '
Devoted to his p arty, Knudsen was annoyed to hear me talk
this way. "So you think that our principles are for s ale?"
"My dear Knudsen , " I replied, "I am not s aying that the
Norwegian government is getting ready to sell me. I am only
s aying that the Kremlin would like to make such a deal."
I do not mean that o ut-and-out b argaining took place between
Litvinov and Koht. I even insist on acknowledging that in
connection with me, Minister Koht conducted himself with more
dignity during the election campaign than other ministers. But
various circumstances revealed that the Kremlin was carrying
out in Norway, on a rather large scale, an action that was both
economic and political. The reason for it came out clearly when
the Moscow trial burst forth. Beyond a doubt, the campaign of
the reactionary press against me had been fed from Moscow via
circuitous routes. The GPU's go-betweens furnished my " subver
sive" articles to the right-wing j ournals. Its agents in the
Norwegian section of the Communist International spread
rumors and gossip. The aim was to confuse the country on the eve
of the elections, to intimidate the government and thus prepare it
to yield to an ultimatum. Norwegian shipbuilders, egged on by
the Soviet legation, together with other capitalists who had a
stake in the matter, demanded that the government settle the
Trotsky affair without delay-otherwise unemployment was
likely to increase_ For its part, the government wanted nothing

more th an to surrender to Moscow_ All that it lacked was a
pretext_ To cover its capitulation, the government accused me,
without the slightest basis, of violating the agreements I had
signed on my arrivaL The truth is that the government hoped, by
interning me, to improve the country' s balance of p ayments!
The attitude of the minister of j ustice has been particularly
dishonest. On the eve of my internment, he unexpectedly
telephoned me. The police had already occupied our courtyard.
The minister's voice was suave.
"I h ave received your letter," said he, "and I find that you are
often in the right. I ask only one thing of you: don't send your
letter to the press; don't reply to today's official communique. The
Council of Ministers meets this evening, and I hope that we will
reconsider the decision taken."
I answered that n aturally I was expecting a definitive decision.
The next day I was arrested, they searched my secretaries,
seizing first of all five copies of my letter which were in their
possession and in which I reminded the minister that he had
been present at one of the interviews I had accorded the press.
The honorable minister was afraid that disclosure of this fact
would hurt him with the voters. So much for this guardian of the
law!
As you know, the Soviet government did not dare demand my

extradition, either before or during the trial. Could it h ave been
otherwise? A demand for extradition would have had to be made
before a Norwegian court; and for Moscow's j udges, this would
have been putting their own head in the noose. All I could do was
to take legal action against the so-called Communists and the
Norwegian fascists , who were repeating Moscow's s landers. The
day of my internment the minister of j ustice had given me the
assurance that I would have the opportunity to defend myself
against the charges directed against me. But the minister of
j ustice's deeds are in flagrant contradiction with his words. In
passing special laws against me, does not the Norwegian
government give a go-ahead signal to all the hirelings who
slander me? "From now on you can vilify Trotsky as much as you
want and with impunity, anywhere in the world. We h ave him
bound and gagged and we will not let him defend himself."
Gentlemen of the j ury, I have been called before this court as a
witness in the case of the ransacking of my apartment. The
government has been kind enough to have me accompanied to
In Closed Court 485
the courthouse by a squad of policemen. Yet, in the case of my

stolen archives in Paris, the Norwegian government s eized the
deposition I addressed to the examining magistrate there. Why
this difference in treatment? Would it not be because, in the first
case, the government is faced with Norwegian fascists, whom it
considers its enemies; and in the second case, it is faced with
GPU gangsters , whom it considers its friends? I accuse the
Norwegian government of trampling underfoot the most elemen
tary principles of law. The trial of the sixteen is the first of a
series of similar trials in which not only my honor and my life
and those of my family, but the honor and the lives of hundreds
of people are at stake. Under these circumstances how can they
forbid me-the main defendant and the most informed witness
how can they forbid me to make known what I know? To do that
is consciously and deliberately to obstruct the march of truth.
Whoever by threat or violence prevents a witness from telling the
truth commits a grave crime, severely punishable by Norwegian
law. Of this I am convinced. It is indeed possible that the
minister of justice will take new measures against me-after my
present deposition. The resources of arbitrary power are inex
haustible. But I promised to tell you the truth, the whole truth,
and I have kept my word.
(The president of the court asks the parties if they have any
more questions for the witness and, on receiving a negative
response, asks the witness if he wishes to s wear to his testimony
under oath.)
Trotsky: Not belonging to any religion, I cannot take a

religious o ath. But knowing the importance of my testimony, I
am ready to confirm it before you under oath, that is, to assume
full j uridical responsibility for every word I have spoken.
(The audience rises. Hand upraised, the witness repeats the

oath. Escorted by the police, he lea ves the room-to be taken back
to Sundby, the place of his internment.)
FOR THE EARLIE ST P O S S IBLE
DEPARTURE FROM NORWAY463
D ecember 16, 1936
Dear Comrade Meyer:

I received your letter of the twelfth today, the sixteenth. I have
no doubts whatso ever about your goodwill in attempting to do
everything in your power to settle the "Trotsky question. " I think
that right now your intervention is absolutely necessary.
Arranging the m atter of my j ourney to Mexico exclusively
through state officials is impo ssible. It is a matter of far too
important, life-and-death questions for my wife and me, and I
want the opportunity to confer with people who are well disposed
toward me. I am very much aware of the political differences that
separate me from you and Knudsen. But what is of concern here
are very fundamental things (as you yourself write) which are
very "loosely" connected with high politics .
I have suggested arranging a meeting with you, Knudsen, and
W. Held. 1 would strictly limit the conversation to safeguarding
the journey, but I can only discuss with those whom 1 trust
personally. The Mexican government's offer and the present state
of affairs present an opportunity that must be taken advantage of
immediately. If matters are drawn out, we may lose this
opportunity. On the other hand, I don't wish to go into something
of this sort with my eyes closed. Hence the necessity of a meeting
with Held, you, and Knudsen. Unfortunately Knudsen speaks
only English, which makes m atters more difficult, especially for
my wife. Hence the combination Knudsen-Held would not be
favorable. The best would be Meyer-Knudsen-Held. If that is not
possible, then Meyer-Held. Of course we would be very happy if
you came alone-with your wife-and this visit can and would be
very useful in this matter. By this matter, I mean the earliest
possible departure from Norway.
I don't wish to go into the other questions here so that you will
receive this letter as soon as possible. Of course, a visit from your
486
For the Ea rliest Possible Departure 487
wife would be most desirable for us. She could also make it easier
for my wife to make a number of purchases (for the trip).
So much for now.
With best greeting s ,
Yours ,
L. Trotsky
P.S. -Did you receive the copy of Revolution Betrayed that I

sent you?
VALUABLE TIME I S BEING LOST464
D ecember 1 7 , 1936
Dear Comrade H. Meyer:

I have to add to my letter of yesterday. Immediately after
receiving the offer from Mexico, I set down the elementary
conditions for security on our j ourney, through Puntervold. On
December 1 1 , I communicated the same considerations to the
government through Captain J . Lie. On December 1 3 the minister
of j ustice visited me, unfortunately not to give me an answer, but
rather to listen to the same suggestions I had made twice
previously. The minister of j ustice promised m e categorically (he
repeated it three times) that I would receive an answer
"tomorrow ", i . e . , Monday. Today is Thursday and I have still
received no answer. Thus valuable time is being lost and the offer
from Mexico can be totally compromised by this delay.
I considered writing to the president of the Storting to suggest
that I be afforded the opportunity to present the real state of
affairs before a small commission of the Storting. But that would
unavoidably lead to a political confrontation. That I do not need.
I want to leave Norway as quickly as possible. Hence I will wait a
few days for the promised " answer. " Your vis it would-as I have
sa i d -make the matter much easier. I do not believe that your
government wishes to force me and my wife to the kind of
extreme protest measures we used in the czarist prisons
measures which seldom fail to exercise an effect on public
opinion .
The purely practical questions of the visa and the journey can
and must be handled objectively and reasonably. Reasonably
means primarily by conferrin g with people whom we, the
interested parties, have confidence in. It is really painful to have
to "motivate" these concerns again . .
With best greetings ,
Leon Trotsky
488
S HAME ! 4 6 5
D ecember 18 , 1 9 3 6
T h e report o n the first Moscow tri al b y the l awyer Rosenmark

(who i s the person hiding under thi s name?) is one of the most
wretch e d documents of our time. (This report was published in
the issue of Cahiers des Droits de I'Homme dated November 15,
1936.) This s olemn p u blication puts an i ndelible stain on the
Fren ch League for th e Rights of Man, whose very name, in the
present circumstances , s o un ds like a mockery.
In Moscow, a bloody j uridical comedy was prepared, rehearsed,
and carried out by Stalin and his GPU over a p eriod of ye ars . The
preparati o n of this trial w as announced in its broad outlines by
me and b y many others through th e press-not only quite some
time before the trial itself but even before the assassin ati on of
Kirov . Likewis e , the most important stages of the preparation, in
particular the different ways of extorti n g "confessions, " were
openly exposed by m e and by others in the press in the co urse of
the last eight or nine years.
Abro ad are living dozens of people, beginning with the
president of the French C o uncil , Leon Blum, who have at their
disposal irrefutable affidavits and m aterial th at can throw light
on th e criminal activity of the GPU . The two principal accused,
my son and I, are abroa d. None of these facts exist for the
Rosen m arks . They rely s o l ely on the documentary texts of the
GPU, that is, of the organizers of the j uridical murder. They
behave like commentators impressed by the indictment of
Vyshin sky , whom Fouche surpasses in skill but not in base
ness . 4 ri li
To prove his " objectivity" Rosenm ark quotes the executi oner's
wagon load of crude insults t o his victi m s and in amicably gentle
tones deplores his lack of s erenity. This single word, like the rest
of the diabolical repertory of th e GPU , l ay s bare the duplicity,
hypocrisy, and Tartuffi s m that char acterize the "expertise" of
Rosenmark, whatever th e motives that inspire him. At the s ame
489
time that he discovers the absence of serenity in the clique of a

C aesar Borgia, Fouche, and Company, Rosenmark discovers in
these people certain advantages in comparison even with
democratic justice, whose representatives he attacks.
" Let us observe at the same time," writes this glorious defender
of the Rights of Man, "one laudable particularity in the Russian
procedure: Trotsky, not being present, was not sentenced in
contumacy as he would have been, I believe, in any other country
in the world. The tribunal simply ( ! ! ! ) stipulated that should he
present himself on Soviet territory, he would be arrested and
tried. "
By these lines, Rosenmark-in passing-sentences me to death
"in contumacy " ; that, in his own words, would be the procedure
in all countries of the world.
However, the GPU j udges demanded only my arrest, a
"laudable particularity." What miserable clumsiness is in this
cynicism! It is altogether clear: the friendly reproaches about
Vyshinsky's language serve our defender of j ustice only as a
justification for the crime committed and so the preparation of
new crimes of the same order.
"Trotsky, not being present"-our Tartuffe used this fl at
expression deliberately, in order to conceal disagreeable facts :
Trotsky did n o t flee the trial; l o n g a g o he was expelled from the
USSR; he has been deprived of Soviet citizenship; no one
summoned him to appear before the tribunal. The indictment was
published so late that Trotsky could not figure in the trial. After
the verdict, which was pronounced according to the method of
surprise and which resembled a shot in the back (here is another
"laudable particularity"), the Moscow government did not dare
demand the extradition of Trotsky and of his son Sedov. Why?
Why did the government-which , if we are to believe the Pritts
and Rosenmarks , was armed with so many proofs-why did the
government not demand the extradition of Trotsky, either before
or after the trial? Yet, according to the very words of the
spokesman for the Rights of Man, on the basis of furnished
proofs Trotsky would have been condemned to death in any other
country. How are we to explain this cowardly " particularity" in
the behavior of Stalin, Yagoda, Vyshinsky and the other
falsifiers? Quite simply: all the "confessions" collapse through
th e inconsistency of the accus ations themselves ; the entire
scaffolding cannot bear the slightest examination by free
criticism.
The entire Moscow trial, at its different stages, was directed
Shame! 491
only against Trotsky. This is what is clear to any person capable

of political thinking. If Stalin has shouldered the responsibility
for the act of C ain perpetrated a g ainst Zinoviev , Kamenev, and
the others , it is not because their deaths were in themselves
necessary to him. Zinoviev and Kamenev h ad been sufficiently
annihilated and p aralyzed by their confessions and by prison.
The bodies of Zinoviev and Kamenev were only rungs on a ladder
which would make it possible to reach Trotsky. And if Stalin has
not m ade up his mind to demand the extradition of Trotsky, to
take this latest practical step which alone j ustifies in his eyes the
trials of Moscow, Novosibirsk, and all the other places, it is
because no public tribunal in any country-c ontrary to the
iniquitous assertion of Rosenmark-would consent to yield to
Stalin ' s demands. Trotsky and his son have in their possession
irrefutable proofs of the falsity of the entire accus ation. Because
of their extent and continuity, the personal archives of Trotsky
could not be used in a wretched a malgam .
When I tried to show a part of the documents in public while
taking court action against slandering Norwegi an fascists and
" C ommunists , " Stalin forced the Norwegian government to
declare immunity for the slanderer s . Over and above the bargain
that was arranged, he ordered his agents to steal my archives in
Pari s . The whole operation, w e repeat, relied on the effect of
s urprise: shake the whole world by the surprise and by
immeasurable falsification; annihilate Trotsky; m ake it difficult
for him to defend himself; and charge friends Pritt and
Rosenmark with whitewashing and embellishing this detestable
work with "obj ective and purely j uridical" considerations.
The Pritts and Rosenmarks are ready for anything. With their
dishonest collaboration, the Kremlin is trying to gradually
prepare the public opinion of the " democratic countries" for the
physical destructio n of people whom the bureaucracy considers to
be the implacable enemies of its privileges, its usurpation, and its
corruption.
In all serenity, Rosenmark does n ot hesitate to assert that any
other government would h ave sentenced my son and me to death
since proof had been given at the Moscow trial that I had
organized terrorist attacks in liaison with the Gestapo. Anyone
who knows even a little about the history of the revolution and
about human psychology, in p articular about the biographies of
the people involved, would admit without difficulty that there are
a thousand times m ore grounds for supposing that Rosenmark
and Pritt are in the service of Stalinism than for admitting for a
single moment that Trotsky could be an ally of the Gestapo. This

is something for which the League for the Rights of M an will
never be able to supply proof to anyon e .
I hear the name Rosenmark for the first time. They say he is a
skillful bourgeois politician. I do not know in what way he was
more particularly qualified to appear as a moral and j uridical
authority in an affair of such historic importance. It is possible
that Rosenmark-unlike Pritt, who was always able to appear at
the place and time he was required-is a n arrow philistine who is
completely ignorant of revolution and counterrevolution, of the
psychology of militant revolutionaries, and of the methods of the
Thermidorean bureaucracy; who has even forgotten the history of
the Great French Revolution and its amalgams; who does not
understand that the Russian Fouquier-Tinvilles4 6 7 and Fouches
incontestably surpass in technique their French prototypes, and
have for a long time been working in favor of the bureaucracy's
totalitarian regime, which no longer has anything i n common
with the dictatorship of the proletariat. Possibly-and it is even
likely-Rosenmark understands nothin g about these questions.
But why h ave they given him a task too heavy for his shoulders?
And here is the nub of the question: Why have they rushed into
print his s candalous report with such " genial impatience" in the
very first place in the bulletin of the League for the Rights of
Man? Such imprudent acts are not done for nothing. Inevitably
we come to the conclusion that we are confronted with a still
more s erious blemish than the product of the wit of a n arrow
philistine multiplied by j uridical cretinism.
The essential lie on which the Moscow amalgam rests (and

consequently the "expertise" of Rosenmark and his consorts), is
that the j uridical scaffolding, which in any case does not stand
up to examination by an honest critic, is in no way related to the
historical and political situation, is devoid of all human
psychology and, so to speak, chemically neutralizes it. Kirov is
killed. A group of people are suspected. At first they are silent.
Then they repent and confess to abominable crimes . The verdict
is based on the free confessions of the accused. That is the official
thesis .
Everything i n this is a lie and a deception. I t includes n o
tenable argument.
The history of the Moscow trial is examined by Rosenmark
not on the basis of historical facts known to everyone, and not
even on the basis of all the acts and all the official documents of
the Moscow government.
Shame! 493
Despite all obstacles, truth hews out a way. The whole trial
rests on confessions that are surprising in their crudeness and
teeming with psychological contradictions. In order to under
stand the value of these standardized " confessions" by the clients
of the GPU one must b egin by examining the standardized
political capitulations , of which the "confessions" are the sequel
and the i m mediate development. The history of the capitulations
extends over the last thirteen years, and would, with the
"human" documents, furnish matter for many dozens of volumes.
Naturally , Rosenmark h asn't the slightest suspicion of this
important fact, which dominates the whole Soviet atmosphere
and particularly that of the j udiciary.
The content of the confessions in no way corresponds with the
characteristics of a " crime," whether carried out or not; r ather it
corresponds with the diverse needs of the government. That is
why the public confessions h ave a purely ritualistic, standardized
character. Their sole p olitical significance is to teach everyone to
think, or at least to express himself, uniformly. But precisely for
this reason no one among the persons in question has taken these
"repentances" seriously. These confessions are not real confes
sions but a contract signed with the bureaucracy. The proof of
this is that even LN. Smirnov, one of the most sincere and
honorable of men, in 1 9 29 drew up in the space of a few w eeks
several different texts of confessions which were in fl a grant
contradiction with one another. (These texts were published at
the time in the Biulleten Oppozitsii. ) I m ust add that nearly all
the confessions (tens of thousands of them) belonging to the
Thermidorean period had but one single obj ect, n amely, to attack
me personally. In order to be received back into the bosom of the
great family of the bureaucracy, or to assure himself at least the
right to a m orsel of bread, each Oppositionist, semi-Oppositionist,
or even mere citizen, was compelled on all occasions to denounce
Trotskyism and condemn Trotsky. The more startling the
manner of these denunciations the more Sllccess they h ad.
Confessions and renunci ations have become for them very like
the rituals of the church. Thus political confessions have p aved
the way for j udicial confessions which are their inevitable
consequencp..
I repeat, these lines are being written in the claws of the
Norwegian "Socialist" government. I am forced to confine myself
to the most important facts .
I beg the reader to take into account that I have no opportunity
to reread and correct what I have written.
We must throw into relief particularly the following points:
1 . It is false that " all sixteen defendants" h ave admitted their

crime. There were not sixteen defendants who participated in a
crime of the same n ature or who were even s uspected of a like
crime. In actual fact the sixteen men in the dock had been
meticulously cho sen from among m any hundreds, many thou
s ands of "candidate s . " Only those who had proved their aptitude
for publicly fulfilling the role which had been assigned to them
were in the first instance made to appear before the tribunal . ( O n
this subj ect s e e the Red Book.)
2. Did the GPU use medical or chemical methods of compul
sion? I do not know. But such a hypothesis is not necessary. It is
enough to know the facts, the persons, and the circumstances in
order to understand how the defendants could have been forced to
put the rope around their own necks. Among the defendants there
was not a single O ppositionist or Trotskyist. They were all
capitulators, persons who had confessed on m any occasions,
accusing themselves in their confessions of the most shameful
actions and the lowest instincts; persons who h a d renounced all
political conceptions, all reason for living, all personal dignity.
(Of course, I am not speaking of real provocateurs, l ost in the
clutches of the GPU.) For years these ex-revolutionaries,
demoralized and morally broken, had flitted b ack and forth
between life and death. Were n arcotics still necess ary? The very
idea (which Rosenmark takes responsibility for) that these people
had been spurred on by a thirst for power is absurd. They had
renounced it long since. The idea that these people, who had
renounced their program, their b anner, their personal dignity,
who had many a time publicly covered themselves with
mortification and slander, could hope to attain p ower by political
assassinations would seem an idiotic political conception.
No, at the trial the defendants gave themselves the lie as they
had done before in their innumerable confessions. The GPU took
plenty of time to extort from its victims increasingly complete
" confessions. " Today "A" admitted a little "fact . " If "B" does not
admit the same thing it implies that all his past confessions and
humiliations were "lies" (Stalin's favorite wor d,-Stalin, the
champion of " sincerity"). "B" h astens to admit what "A" has
admitted, and even a little more. And now it' s " e ' s " turn again.
To avoid any overly crude contradictions, they are given the
opportunity, if they wish, to elaborate their theme in common. If
" D " refuses to associate himself with this he risks losing all hope
of s aving himself. So he outdoes the others in order to prove his
goodwill (reread the stammering and hysterical confessions of
Shame! 495
Reingold). And now all the others must align their lies with those
of " E . " . . . The infernal game continues . The accused are under
lock and key. The GPU is in no hurry. The GPU has Mausers.
Jules Romains shows (in his Les Creatures) how it is possible
without h aving any "idea" or "theme" to write a truly poetical
work by taking as a point of departure a play on words. The GPU
works thus. These gentlemen, having at their disposal neither
facts nor a completed plan, construct their amalgam by a pl ay on
"confession s . " If one or another of the confessions appears
inconvenient in the end, it is quite simply omitted as an
unnecessary hypothesis . These " creatures " are free of all ties.
From time to time they give their victims a provisional liberty
in order to allow the rebirth of vague hopes. At the first
opportunity those who h ave been freed are arrested once more.
Thus ceaselessly tossed between hope and despair these men
become little by little the shadow of their former selves .
But still this is not the end. For each one of them there comes a
moment when they begin to resist. N o , they cannot go to such
lengths in denial of themselves . At this point the GPU shoots the
most obstinate.
Meanwhile the press unanimously continues to yell against the
"traitors , " the "counterrevolutionaries, " the " agents of imperial
ism, " and so forth. The prisoners have no other press at their
disposal than that of Stalin. Physical torture? I think not. The
torture of slander, of uncertainty, and of terror destroys the
nervo us system of th e accused j ust as s urely as physical torture.
And one must add the fact of the incess ant allusion to the
dangers of war. Are you for the fatherland (that is, for Stalin), or
against the fatherland? Pra vda calls even Andre Gide's book an
" anti-Soviet witness . " A foreigner of less renown would have
been treated long since as an agent of Hitler. What is to be s aid of
the Soviet Oppositionists? Gide shows how they extorted from
him a telegram of praise for Stalin and how the celebrated author
was reduced to impotence and . . . to capitul ation. What shall we
say then of the methods of the GPU? Are you for the U S S R (that
is, for Stalin), or against the USSR? Y o u have repented of course
long ago; you are not dangerous to us as you yourself know; we
don't wish you ill. But Trotsky continues his poisonous work
abroad. He continues his sapping exploits against the USSR
(that is, against the omnipotence of the bureaucracy). His
influence is growing. Trotsky must be discredited once and for all .
Thus your question resolves itself. If you are for the USSR you
will help us. If not, all your repentance was a lie. In view of the
appro aching war we shall be forced to consider you as agents of

Tro tsky, as en emies inside the country. You m ust admit that
Trotsky has p u s he d you on to the path of terror. -But no one will
believe it!-Oh! we will take care of this aspect of the question. We
have our D uclos and our Thorez , our Pritts and our Rosenm arks .
Has Trotsky pushed you onto the p ath of terror, yes or no? H e
w h o replied " Y e s " i s ready to allow himself to be u s e d further.
B y repeating the questions endles sly, the replies can be made
increasingly c o n crete. Smirnov and Golts m an tried to stop
themselves in midroad, between " terror in gen eral " and the
assas sination of Kirov.
Oth ers (but not all) went further. Whoever resisted was
liquidated in the course of the "technical" preparation of the tri al .
The man against whom violence w a s s ucces sful was led on the
scene to be presented to the eyes of Pritt i n the capacity of an
imp arti al expert.
Is it possi b l e to talk to any h o norabl e person about these
"confessions" and neglect the fact that for y e ars the GPU has
prep ared and " questioned" the d efen dants with the hel p of
periodic capitulati o n s , h u m i l i ations, self-degrad ation, slan ders ,
and also by means of repri sals? O nly complete fools can shut
their eyes to these facts. *
The s tatem e n t th a t th e defe n d a n ts admitted the facts whi c h
incrimin ated them independently of o n e another is a tri ple lie.
There is no m aterial proof of the confessions. The defendants
abandoned them sel ves to self-accus ations and s ummary denunci
atio n s . They were utterly terrifi e d that these accus ati ons should
*Dr. Ciliga, a Yugoslav revolutionary who, as an oppositionist, spent

several years in the GPU's prisons a n d places of deportation , testifies: "I
saw a sailor who, on m any occasio n s , was told, on being taken out of his
cell in the evening, that he was going to be shot. He was led into the
courtyard, and then brought b ack to his cell. 'Since you are a worker we
don't want to shoot you like some White Guard. As a worker, you must
confess sincerely . . . . ' The sailor confessed nothing, but after these
tortures he became half-mad. Then at last they left him in peace. But they
still ask him for co n fessions on the subject of his conspiracy against
Stalin . "
The s tory o f this unfortunate s ailor i s but a tin y episode taken from the
book o f the confessions of the accused- a n d of thei r accusers and their
j udges . From bei ng the instrument of the revolution , the GPU has become
the instrument o f the Soviet aristocracy, the personal instrument of
Stalin , about whom Lenin warned in 1 922: "This cook will prepare only
peppery dishes . "
Shame! 497
be made more preci s e . It is not by chance that each time one of

the defendants , in order to s u pport the logic of his own
confessions, tried to make the times and pl aces definite, the GPU
fell into contradicti o n s th at were only too crying. As far as the
concrete elements of their own confe s sions are concerned, the
defe n d ants contradicted thems elves and each o ther. Only a
fraction of these contradictions is bro ught to light in the Red
Book, about which Pritt and Rosen m ark grit their teeth .
M u s t we return again to Golts m an ' s confessions? Among the
accused of the older generation Goltsm an alone " p erson ally saw"
me and was s aid to h ave received from me "terrorist" instruc
tion s . My son, Leon Sedov, is said t o h ave been the intermedi ary
and organizer of the meeting. His meeting with Golts man is
alleged to have taken place at th e H o tel Bristol . This is the chief
point i n the confession.
Alas! My son has n ever been to C openhagen. The fact that he
did not go there in 1932 can be incontes tably proved b y means of
visas, telegram s, and statements coming from m ore than thirty
persons of differen t n ation alities and different p o li ti c al tenden
cies . The Hotel Bristo l , where the m e e ting is supposed to have
taken place, has n o t been in existence since 1 9 1 7. What then does
Goltsman's confession mean?
The declarations o f B erman-Yuri n , Fritz David, and Olberg 'are
full of similar abs urdities and nonsense. Nevertheless, on the
basis of th ese confession s , the defen ders of the Rights of M an
(and of the interests of the GPU ) consi der me worthy of the death
penalty. How far can human baseness go?
But h owever scandalous the confes sions of Goltsman and
o thers may be, their contradictions and their crude inventions
seem to be merely decorations designed to adorn the walls of this
strange monument o f lies and errors.
The whole indictment and all the confessions cen ter aro und the
assassin ation of Kirov . The organiz ation of this m urder, however,
was a ch ain in the struggle agai n s t the Opposition. The plot
agai n s t Kirov was organized b y the GPU for the p u rpose of
striking a blow at the Leningrad organization of Zinovievists.
Stalin , Yagoda , Kirov hims elf, were in close touch with the
conspiracy. This fact i s proved beyond any shadow of a doubt by
the trial of Medved , the former chief of the Leni n grad GPU. The
plot against Kirov was to h ave h ad a fictiti ous character; it was
essentially directed ag ainst the Opposition.
Stalin did not wish t o kill Kirov; Kirov himself did not wish to
be killed; but Nikolaev, althou g h s urrounded o n all sides by
agents provocateurs, himself took his role too seriously. He

escaped from their control and fired before the GPU had
succeeded in finishing its amalgam (see my pamphlet, The
Stalinist Bureaucracy and the Assassination of Kiro v.) What is
written there about the preparation of the Moscow tri als (both the
first and those which have followed) is the result of logical
deduction. I have unveiled the plans of the GPU month by
month, year by year, stage by stage, especially since the
beginning of 1929. The indelible traces of the methodical
preparation of articles in the Soviet press, by the interviews of
Stalin and Molotov, by various " antiterrorist" decl arations of
Litvinov at Geneva (a propos of the assassination of King
Alexander and B arthou), and by a whole series of other
documents, declarations, and suggestions which at the time
seemed incomprehensible but which, at the present moment,
clearly reveal their criminal meaning.
In summing up, one m ay say not that the trials of the terrorists
have been arranged because Kirov was murdered, but that the
ass assination of Kirov took place "by accident" during the
feverish preparation of the trials against the terrorists.
Sycophants a l a Pritt and Rosenmark consider it out of the

question that Stalin's chaste GPU could organize trials which
were merely criminal dramatizations in which the roles had been
fixed in advance. On the other hand they find it quite natural
that the Opposition-which is a Communist tendency with a long
tradition , experienced cadres , an elaborated program, and
abundant political literature-should suddenly make an about
face, quite unexpectedly, toward individual terrorism, which it
has always condemned as adventurism without results. This
tendency, which comprises many thousands of symp athizers,
accomplishes this incredible about-face in complete silence,
without any previous discussion, without any decl aration,
without any criticism , without any internal struggle, without any
terrorist propaganda, without any literature.
But even this is not enough. This tendency, which has shown
itself capable of the greatest sacrifices in struggle for its program,
enters into relations with the Gestapo! And moved to this by the
"thirst for power"! As if power in the USSR could be obtained
with the aid of the Gestapo ! And how can one attribute this
"thirst for power" to tens of thousands of rank- and-file Opposi
tionists , workers, members of Young Communist organizations,
who experience unheard-of repressions and privations? Only a
narrow and over-fed bourgeois who knows nothing of revolution-
Shame! 499
ary struggle, and who, at the same time, is always ready to lick
the boots of any go vernment in power, could believe so vile a lie.
Let us, however, concede the impossible. Let us concede
precisely that the Trotskyists , in contradiction to their doctrine,
their program, their present writings, and their private correspon
dence (which is at the disposal of any honest commission of
inquiry) , have become terrorists-without internal struggles or
splits, without the inevitable defections and denunciations. Let us
admit that terrorism was necess ary for them to restore capital
ism. Why was this new program accepted in silence by everyone,
without reprobation, without criticism, without opposition? Let us
concede further-a few absurdities more or less are of no
importance-that in order to ensure the restoration of capitalism
and the victory of fascism (yes , yes, even fascism), the Trotsky
ists signed a p act with the Gestapo, and that they have been
pursuing their terrorist activity at least from 1 9 3 1 to the middle of
1 93 6 . Where? How? But this m atters little. It all took place in the
fourth dimension. They were continually trying to assassinate all
the "leaders," to disorganize the economy, to prepare victory for
Hitler and the Mikado.
C an w e take all these base absurdities for legal tender? But
what do we see in the end? In the middle of 1 936, the leaders of
this strange tendency, accused of having taken part in these
crimes, suddenly repent, all at the s ame time, and admit to the
crimes they had committed (that is, had not committed). E ach
one rushes to cover himself with as much mud as he can, and
each tries to drown the voice of the others in singing the praises
of Stalin, whom yesterday he wanted to kill. How can we explain
this miracle of S aint Yagoda? C ounterrevolutionaries, terrorists,
mad fascists, transformed into hysterical fl agellants. Let the
Pritts and Rosenmarks explain this mystery.
Finally let us suppose that the idea of terrorism was in fact
accepted at some time by this group of capitulators and by others,
and that in their confessions before the tribunal an echo of the
truth was heard (alleged plots of the type: "To hell with Stalin! " )
B u t why bring the Trotskyists a n d Trotsky himself onto the
scene? These people do not conceal their aim: to bring to an end
the absolutism of the Stalinist clique, not by individual terrorist
adventures , but by the methods of the revolutionary cl ass
struggle. In these circumstances, would it not be natural for an
" obj ective" j urist to ask himself: did not the government promise
these dishonest capitulators that it would soften their fate if they
would consent s omehow to implicate Trotsky, enemy number one
of the Stalinist clique?
What more natural than the hypothesis that the confessions

may contain a morsel of the truth? But no, you see, our j urists
consider it impossible that the accused hoped to be reprieved.
They asked for death themselves, then. They "freely" renounced
counsel for the defense. What sinister hypocrisy! What shame!
These wretched men , humiliated and broken, asked death for
themselves so that they might better fulfill their odious role, and
thus attempt to save their lives. It was prearranged in the
contract. At any price, the government required the illusion of
wretched and foundering m en.
The correspondent of the Daily Herald, the organ of the very
party to which the dishonest Pritt belongs, wrote after the
verdict: "The report is widely current that a decree, published
only five days before, which gave them the right to appeal, had
been specially design ed to spare their lives . "
I d o n o t know t o what decree i t i s referring. I t may be that they
did nothing more than spread rumors of s uch a decree. In any
case Stalin did everything to deceive the defendants.
The minister of j ustice h as just told me that tomorrow we are to

embark for Mexico. The j o urney takes twenty days. I h ave been
asking, for a week now, that it be m ade possible for me to see my
friends, take security measures for the duration of the trip, and
specifically, be accompanied by some comrades .
The minister of j ustice visited me on Sunday, the thirteenth; he
promised to give me an answer; he promised, in any case, that
comrade H. and his wife w ould accompany us. I asked for a
preliminary interview with H. Meyer and Knudsen. I was
promised an answer for Monday. Instead of that answer I
received today the government's order: we are to be sent away
tomorrow by special boat on which we are to have two berths.
I said to the minister of j ustice: Certainly you can t ake your
revenge on us physically, but morally you will pay dearly for it,
j ust as the German S ocial Democracy paid dearly for the
assassination of Liebknecht and Ros a Luxemburg. In three, five
years, if the workers allow you to continue the s ame policy, all
your ministers will find themselves in emigration . . . . After that
I went out without shaking hands. N at alia Ivanovna is packing
our bags. For the nth time?
I do not know if my letter will reach you. In any case, I am
consigning this bottle to the sea.
Warm greetings to all friends!
L. Trotsky
A FORMAL DECLARATION468
December 18, 1936
Dear Friend:
The fact that you have finally found the telegram to Herriot
and the message from [Herriot] to the Berlin consul is magnifi
cent. We very much rejoice over that.It is a great triumph.I will
await with impatience the bulletin of the Committee [for an
Inquiry into the Moscow Trial] with a facsimile of this tele
gram ....
It appears that they want to make us leave tomorrow.I will
refrain from commenting on the conditions of this departure.In
any case, I make the following declaration to you, as my lawyer:
If Natalia and I come to a bad turn, en route or otherwise, it is
Leon Sedov, my son, who must dispose of all my "property," that
is, the payments from the different publishers.
I thank you heartily for your active friendship. 'We both
embrace you warmly.
Our most cordial greetings to all our friends.
Please send all our materials and letters to Mexico immedi
ately.
Fraternal greetings.
501
LAST LETTER FROM EUROPE469
December 18, 1936
Dear Lyova:
It seems that tomorrow we are going to be sent to Mexico. This
then is our last letter from Europe. If something happens to us en
route or elsewhere you and Sergei are my heirs.This letter should
have testamentary value . . . . As you know, I have in mind
future royalties on my books-apart from these I possess nothing.
If you ever meet Sergei ... tell him that we have never forgotten
him and never will forget him for a single moment. .. .
502
NOTES
1. " Open Letter for the Fourth International." New Militant, August 3 ,
1935. New Militant w a s the newspaper o f the Workers Party o f the U . S .
T h e first draft of t h i s text w a s written by Trotsky in t h e spring o f 1 935,
while he was still in France, but it was not published until the summer,
after it had been discussed and approved by the v arious organizations
signing it and after Trotsky had moved to Norway. The Fourth
International (FI) was the final n am e of the international political
movement led by Trotsky during his third exile from 1929 to 1 940. It was
called the International Left Opposition-Bolshevik-Leninists
(ILO) from 1930 to 1 933. After Hitler came to power, it discontinued its
original policy of w orking for the reform of the Communist International,
proclaimed the need for a new Interna tional, changed its name to the
International Communist League (ICL), and set to work gathering
forces for revolutionary parties throughout the world. Trotsky proposed
that the Fourth I nternational be founded at an I C L conference in July
1936, but the conference instea d established the Movement for the
Fourth International (MFI). The FI's founding conference was hel d in
France in September 1938.
2. Adolph Hitler ( 1 8891945) was appointed chancellor of Germany in
January 1933 and, at the head of the Nazi Party, led Germany into World
War II. The Second International b egan in 1889 as a loose association
of Social Democratic and labor p arties, uniting both revolutionary and
reformist elements. Its progressive role ended in 1 9 1 4 , when its m aj or
sections violated the most elementary socialist principles and supported
their own imperialist governments in W orld War 1. It fell apart during the
war, but was revived as a completely reformist organization in 1 9 1 9 . The
Third (or Communist) International (Comintern) was organized
under Lenin's leadership in 1 9 1 9 as the revolutionary successor to the
Second International. Stalin dissolved the Comintern in 1 943 as a gesture
of goodwill to his imperialist allies.
3 . The Declaration of Four was signed by the International
Communist League, the Revolutionary Socialist Party and the Indepen
dent S ocialist P arty of Holland , and the Socialist Workers Party of
Germany. Its text is in Writings 33-34.
4. In February 1 93 4 , the workers of Vienna rose in a heroic insurrecti on
against repressive measures of the right-wing regime of Engelbert
Dollfuss but were defeated, in part because of the vacillation of their
Social Democratic leaders. The Austrian Social Democracy had previous-
503
ly refused to lead a serious struggle against the Dollfuss regime,

"tolerating" him as a lesser evil to the Nazis. These policies enabled both
Dollfuss and the Nazis to consolidate their strength and smash the
powerful Austrian labor movement.
5. In October 1 934, the right-wing Lerroux government in Spain
smashed a general strike which had expanded into an uprising in
Asturias. Lerroux was able to recapture the town of Oviedo from the
workers and crush the Asturian commune in October and November. In
the process 3,000 workers were killed, 7,000 wounded, and 40,000
imprisoned.
6. Emile Vandervelde (1866- 1 938) was a Belgian Labor Party leader
and president of the Second International, 1 929-36. He was in the cabinet
during World War I and signed the Versailles treaty for Belgium.
7. Hendrik de Man ( 1 885- 1 953) was a Belgian Labor Party leader and
author in 1 9:3:3 of a "labor plan" to end the depression and promote
production, a major point of which provided for the government to buy
out the capitalists. (See Writings 3334 for Trotsky's comments.) Karl
Marx ( 1 8 1 8- 1 883) was, along with Engels, the founder of scientific
socialism and the leader of the First International, 1864-76.
8. Paul-Henri Spaak ( 1 89 9 - 1 972) was briefly a left-winger in the
Belgian Labor Party and editor of Action socialiste in 1934. In 1935,
however, he became a minister in the Belgian cabinet and later was
secretary-general of NATO.
9. The French Radical Party, or Radical Socialists, was the
principal capitalist party of France between the two world wars, and was
comparable to the Democratic Party in the U.S.
10. The British Labour Party, founded in 1906 and affiliated to the
Second International, held power in HJ24 and 1929-3 1 , but was defeated in
the 19:-\5 election and did not return to power until 1945.
11. Franklin D. Roosevelt (18821945) was Democratic president of
the U.S. from 1 9 3:3 until his death. His plan, the New Deal, was a
program of reforms designed to alleviate the worst conditions of the
Depression and buy off the militancy of the American workers.
12. Maxim Litvinov (1876- 1 95 1 ) was Soviet people's commissar of
foreign affairs, 1 930-39. Stalin used him to personify "collective security"
when he sought alliances with democratic imperialists, and shelved him
during the period of the Stalin-Hitler pact and the cold war. The U.S.
government recognized the Soviet Union in 1 9 33.
1 3. In 1924 the Workers (Communist) Party in the U.S. formed a
Farmer-Labor Party with a populist program. This attempt to create a
mass farmer-labor party with little backing from the masses threw the
Workers Party into turmoil and was abandoned for a decision to run a
Communist ticket in the elections.
1 4. The 1934 strikes of Toledo Auto-Lite workers, Minneapolis
teamsters, and San Francisco longshoremen reversed a situation in
which American workers had been losing strike after strike. A detailed
account of the significance of these three strikes is found in chapter four
of Art Preis's Labor's Giant Step (Pathfinder Press, 1972).
Notes for Pages 19-23 505
1 5 . The Saar region of Germany, under French control after Worl d

War I , voted overwhelmingly i n a 1 9 3 5 referendum i n favor o f return to
Germany.
1 6. The "third period," according to the schema proclaimed by the
Stalinists in 1 9 28, was the final p eriod of capitalism, the period of its
immediately impending demise and replacement by s o viets. Flowing from
this, the Comintern' s tactics during the years 1 928-34 were marked by
ultraleftism , sectarianism, the building of small "red" unions instead of
work in the m a s s l abor unions , and refusal to build united fronts with
other working class organizations. The Stalinists aban doned this policy
in 1 934, and the following year adopted the People's Front policy.
17. Joseph Stalin ( 1 879-1 953 ) became a Social Democrat in 1 898,
j oined the Bolshevik faction in 1 904, and was a member of its Central
Committee from 1 9 1 2. After the February revolution and before Lenin
returned and reoriented the Bolsheviks toward winning power, he favored
a conciliatory attitude toward the Provisional Government. He was
commissar of n ation alities in the first Soviet government and became
general secretary of the CP in 1 922. Lenin call ed in 1923 for his removal
from that post because h e was using it to bureaucratize the p arty and
state apparatuses. After Lenin's death in 1 9 24, Stalin grad ually
eliminated his major opponents, starting with Trotsky, until he became
virtual dictator of the p arty and the Soviet Union in the 1 930s. The chief
concepts associated with his name are "socialism in one country," "s oci al
fascism," and " p eaceful coexistence . "
18. Amalgam w a s the term Trotsky freq uently u s e d to designate the
Kremlin's practice of lumping together different or opposing political
tendencies and accusing them of common crimes or sins.
1 9 . The League of Nations, which Lenin called a "thieves' kitchen,"
was created by th e Versailles Peace Conference in 1919, ostensibly as a
form of world government and cooperation that would prevent future
wars. Its complete bankruptcy became clear when it was unabl e to have
any effect on the Japanese invasion of China, the Italian invasion of
Ethiopia, and other links in the chain that led to World W ar I I . The So viet
military alliance with French imperialism refers to the M ay 1935
Soviet-French nonaggression pact, signed by Stalin and French Foreign
Minister Laval in Moscow.
20. Pierre Laval (1883-1945), a Socialist in his youth, was a
Republican minister of forei gn affairs, 1 984-35, and negotiated the
Franco-Soviet pact. He was premier, 1 935-36 and again in 1942, when h e
p ursued a policy of collaboration with Germ any. H e was executed for
treason after the w ar. A final communique after the signing of the
Stalin-Laval pact stated : " Duty first of all obligates them not to weaken
in any way their m eans of national defense. In this respect Mr. Stalin
understands and fully approves of the policy of n ational defense made by
France in order to keep its armed strength at the level of security_"
2 1 . On August 4, 1914, the German Social Democracy voted for the
war budget of the imperialist government in violation of its prewar
pledges to oppose militarism in war and peace. On the same day the
French and B el gian Socialist p arties issued m anifestos declaring s upport

for their governments in war. The date is used by Marxists to designate
the collapse of the Second International as a revolutionary force.
22. Vladimir Ilyich Lenin ( 1 8701 924) restored Marxism as the theory
and practice of revolution in the imperialist epoch after it had been.
debased by the opportunists, revisionists, and fatalists of the Second
International. H e initiated the Bolshevik tendency, which was the first to
build the kind of party needed to lead a working class revolution. H e led
the first victorious workers' revolution in 1 9 1 7, and served as head of the
first Soviet government. He founded the Communist International and
helped elaborate its principles, strategy, and tactics. He prepared a fight
against the bureaucratization of the Russian CP and the Soviet state, but
died before h e could carry it out.
23. The conference in Zimmerwald, Switzerl and, in September 1 9 15,
was designed to reassemble the antiwar and internationalist currents
that had survived the debacle of the Second I nternational. Although most
of the particip ants were centrists , it proved to be a step in the direction of
a new International. The Zim m erwald manifesto against the war, written
by Trotsky, is in Leon Trotsky Speaks (Pathfinder, 1972).
24. The O ctober Revolution in Russia brought the soviets, led by the
Bolshevik s , to power.
25. This reference to the Two- and-aoHalf International should not
be confused with the Intern ational Association of Socialist Parties ( or
Two-and-a-Half International), which was formed in February 1 9 2 1 by
centrist parties and groups that had left the Second International under
pressure from the revolutionary masses. That group, which reunited with
the Second International in May 1923, is the one originally referred to by
that designation. In this document, Two-and-a-Half International refers
to the Stalinist proposals in 1 9 3 4 and 1935 for organic unity with the
Social Democrats, including a m erger of the Second and Third Interna
tionals.
26. The Amsterdam- Pleyel Committee was typical of organiz ations
"against war" and "against fascism" fostered by the Stalinists in
collaboration with well-known p acifists and liberals as a substitute for
united front working class activity. The principal congresses of these
groups were held in Amsterdam in August 1932 and at the Pleyel h all in
Paris in June 1933.
27. Additional signers of th e Open Letter that summer were the
Cooperative Society of the Friends of the New Age (France); the Cuban
Bolshev',j: Leninists; and the S partacus group in Belgium.
28. The ICL held an international conference in Paris, July 29-3 1 ,
1936. T h e three resol utions that Trotsky wrote for that conference are
included in this volume. Other theses, resolutions, and appeals of the
conference are in Documents of the Fourth International.' The Fo rmative
Years (1933-40) (Pathfinder Press, 1 973). The Open Letter was signed by
P.J. Schmidt and H. Sneevliet for the Revolutionary Socialist Workers
Party of Holland (RSAP); A.J. Muste and James P. Cannon for the
Workers P arty of the U.S. (WPUS); Crux (Trotsky) , Dubois (Ruth Fischer),
and Martin (Alfonso Leonetti) for the I n ternational Secretari at of the

ICL; the Bolshevik-Leninist Group ( GEL) of France; and J. M acDonald
and M. Spector for the Workers P arty of C anada. Peter J. Schmidt
( 1 896-1952) was the leader of the Independent Socialist Party of Holland,
which merged early in 1 935 with the Revol ution ary Socialist Party (RSP)
led by Henricus Sneevliet ( 1 883- 1 942) to form the RSAP, the Dutch
section of the ICL. Schmidt resigned in 1 936 and j oined the Soci al
Democracy. After the war he became a United Nations official. Sneevliet
left the MFI in 1938. I n 1 942 he was arrested and executed by the Nazis.
A.J. Muste (1885-1967), a pacifist and former minister, was head of the
American Workers P arty, which merged with the Communist League of
America in 1 934 to form the WPUS , of which Muste was secretary. In
1 936, Muste resigned and returned to pacifism and the church. In the
1960s he played a leading role in b uilding the movement against the
Vietn am War. James P. Cannon ( 1 8 90- 1 974) , a founder of the American
C P , led in the formation of the Left Opposition after his expulsion from
the CP in 1928. He remained a leader of the American Trotskyist
movement and the FI until his death . Dubois (Ruth Fischer) ( 1 895- 1 9 6 1 )
was a cen tral leader of t h e German C P i n t h e 1 920s. S h e was expelled in
1927 as a supporter of the Russian United Opposition and helped found
the German Leninbund, which collaborated with the Left O pposition
until 1 930. She withdrew from the Leninbund and iIi the mid-thirties
j oined the Trotskyists, serving on the I nternational Secretariat of the ICL
in 1935. She had withdrawn from the Trots kyist m ovement by 1938.
Martin (Alfonso Leonetti) ( 1 895- ) left the Italian C P in 1 930 to found
the New I talian Opposition, which became the Italian section of the ILO.
He was an active member of the International Secretariat of the ILO and
ICL through 1 936. He returned to the Italian CP after W orld War II. The
International Secretariat (IS) was the administrative leadership of the
ILO and ICL. The French Trotskyists took the name Eoishevik
Leninist Group (GBL) in the SFIO (French Soci alist P arty) between
August 1 934 and their expulsion from the Socialist P arty a year later.
Jack MacDonald ( 1 888-1 9 4 1 ) and Maurice Spector (1898- 1 968) were
founders of the Canadian CP, and leaders until their expulsion in the l ate
1 920s. They then founded the C anadian Trotskyist movement, of whi ch
MacDonald was a leader until his death. Spector left the Trotskyist
movement in 1 939.
29. " Luxemburg and the Fourth International." New -International,

August 1 935. New In ternational was the m agazine of the American
Trotskyist movement until April 1 940, when it was repl aced by Fourth
International, whose name was later changed to International Socialist
Review. Rosa Luxemburg ( 1 8 7 1- 1 9 1 9), an outstanding leader of the
Marxis t movement and a prominent o pponent of revisionism and
opportunism before World War I, was j ailed for antiwar activity at the
outbreak of the war in Germany, but was freed by the Novem ber 19 1 8
uprising. Together with Karl Liebknecht she organize d the German
Communist Party. In January 1 9 1 9 she was assassinated by soldiers of

the Social Democratic government.
30. The SAP (Socialist Workers Party of Germany) was formed in
October 1 9 3 1 , after the Social Democrats expelled several left-wingers
headed by Max Seydewitz. In the spring of 1 932, a s plit occurred in the
German Communist Right Opposition (KPO, the Brandlerites), and a
group led by Jakob W alcher entered the SAP. When Seydewitz and other
founders withdrew, the ex-Brandlerites assumed the leadership of the
SAP, which then claimed 14,000 members; its numbers were greatly
reduced after Hitler came to power. In August 1933 the SAP j oined with
the I L O in signing the D ecl aration of Four, proclaiming the necessity to
work for a new International. In emigration the SAP moved rapi dly to the
right, eventually becoming an opponent of the MFI. By 1 937 the SAP had
endorsed a People's Front for Germany. Spartacus, not to be confused
with the sectarian Belgian group led by Vereecken, was a s m all centrist
group in the left wing of the French SFIO that favored the SAP. The
Belgian Action socialiste, not to be confused with the French SFIO
periodical of the same name, was the publication of the Belgian Labor
Party's left wing.
3 1 . The revolution of 1905 in Russia grew out of discontent over the
Russo-Japanese War and czarist despotism. It culminated in a general
strike in October and was crushed by the czar in December. See Trotsky's
1905 (Random House, 1 9 72). In her p a mphlet The Mass Strike, the
Political Party, and the Trade Unions, Luxemburg sought to draw the
lessons of the Russian events for the German workers and apply them to
the class struggle in Germany. See Rosa L uxemburg Speaks (Pathfinder
Press , 1 970).
3 2 . As the Germ a n defeat in World W ar I became clear, a German
naval mutiny turne d into a revolutionary movement. On November 8,
1 9 1 8 , the Bavarian S ocialist Republic was proclaimed in Munich. In
Berlin, workers and soldiers organized s oviets, and a delegation of Social
Democrats demanded that the chancellor s urrender the government to the
workers. The Germa n e mpire fell the next day. Hindenburg and Kaiser
Wilhelm II fled to Holland, and a provisional government was estab
lished in Berlin consisting of three Social D emocrats and three members
of the Independent Social Democratic P arty. It was this government that
murdered leading revolutionists and prevented the revolution from going
beyond the establis h m ent of a liberal bourgeois democracy.
33. A.I. Parvus ( 1 8 6 9- 1 924) was a prominent Russian Marxist
pro p agandist and theoretician active in Germany before W orld War 1.
Trotsky broke with him in 1914 when he became an outstanding
supporter of the prowar wing of the German Social Democracy.
34. Rosa Luxemburg's p amphlet The Russian Re volution is in Rosa
Luxemburg Speaks.
3 5 . Paul Froelich ( 1884-1953) led a minority of the German Right
Opposition (KPO) into the SAP in 1 9 3 2 , where he soon became one of the
central leaders. After World War II he returned to West Germany and
j oined the Social D e m o cracy. He wrote a biography, Rosa Luxemburg
(Monthly Review Press, 1972), and edited some of Luxemburg's works.

Miles was Walter Loewenheim , the leader ofa small centrist tendency i n
Germany t h a t was called the New B eginning group from 1931 on a n d had
some influenc e inside SAP emigre circles after Hitler came to power.
Boris Goldenberg, who wrote for the French press under the name of
Bertrand Gilbert, was a German refugee in Paris and a representative o f
t h e SAP during i t s negotiations with t h e ICL in 1933-34. He w a s one o f
t h e founders of t h e Revolutionary Left group i n t h e S F I O i n Septemb er
1935.
36. Jim Schwab ( 1887- ), also called Jakob W al cher, was a founder
of the German CPo He was exp elled from the Comintern in 1 929 as a
supporter of the Communist Right O pposition (KPO). He left the KPO i n
1 9 3 2 a n d until 1939 w a s a leader of t h e SAP Emigre Committee in P aris .
After World War II he returned to Stalinis m , accepting a mlllor
government post i n E ast Germany.
37. Karl Liebknecht (1871-1919) was a left-wing German Soci al
Democrat and antimilitarist. H e was the first to vote against war credits
in the Reichstag in 1914. Imprisoned for antiwar activity from 1 916 to
1918, he was a leader of the Berlin u p rising of 1 919 . H e was assassi n ated
with Luxemburg b y soldiers of the government i n January 1919.
38. "The SAP and the Open Letter. " By permission of the Harvard
College Library. Translated for this volume from the German by Maria
Roth .
39. Jaques de Kadt was the secretary of the Dutch OSP, editor of its
paper De Fakkel (The Torch), and a l eader of its right wing, hostile to the
ICL and to Trotsky. He and his wing were expelled in September 1934,
strengthening the OSP forces who w anted to work with the ICL.
40. The centrist lAG (International Labor Community) was the
predecessor of the London Bureau (see note 108).
41. "For a Special Information Service." By permission of the Harvard

College Library. U nsigned. Translated for this volume from the German
by Maria Roth.
42. The Woo Trotsky refers to is probably Erwin Wolf (1902-1937), a
Czech Trotskyist who served as Trotsky's secretary while he was in
N orway. In 1937 h e was kidnaped and killed by the GPU in Spain. Erde
is Karl Friedberg, a German Trotskyist who emigrated to the Saar region
after Hitler came to power. In August 1933 he visited Trotsky in France.
Otto Wels (1873-1939) was a leading functionary of the German Social
Democratic Party. As military commander of B erlin, Wels crushed the
uprising of 1919. Later he led his party's delegation in the Reichstag. He
was an opponent of united fronts with the CP o Siegfried Aufhaeuser,
an author of the united front p latform of the Austrian Social Democrats
in exile, was expelled by the Social Democratic emigre leadership in
Prague in January 1935.
4 3 . The turn o f the French Stalinists from Stalin's policy
(supporting France's arming for war) to that of the S FIO (pacifism,
51 0 Writings of Leon Trotsky (1 935-36)
disarmament) was an attempt to clear the way of obstacles to a bloc or

merger between the two p arties. SFIO (French Section of the Labor
[Second] International) was the official name of the French Socialist
Party before World W ar II. In 1920 a maj ority of the SFIO left to form the
French CP; the reformist minority retained the name. Leon Blum ( 1 8 72-
1 9 50) was the head of the SFIO in the thirties and premier of the first
People's Front government in 1936.
44. " 'World P arty of Social Revolution.''' By permission of the H arvard

College Library. Unsigned. Translated for this volume from the Germ an
by Maria Roth. The n ame eventually adopted by the F I was "World P arty
of Socialist Revolution. "
45. Rundschau was a German Stalinist p aper published in emigration
in B asle, which succeeded International Press Correspondence (Inpre
korr) as the German press of the Comintern when Inprekorr was forced to
cease publication after Hitler came to power. Parabellum was Arkady
Maslow ( 1 8 9 1 1 9 4 1 ) , a central leader of the German CP in the twenties . He
had been expelled by the Stalinists in 1927 as a supporter of Zinoviev and
helped found the German Leninbund. In 1934 he j oined the ICL with
Ruth Fischer and remained a m ember until 1 937.
46. General Council. This was a proposal to establish a new body for
the ICL, equivalent in its fun ctions to that of an i nternational executive
committee and politically superior to the IS. A body with this name was
elected at the international conference in July 1936, but because of
repression and defections it never met or fun ctioned. The Provisional
Contact Committee proposed at the end of the Open Letter later became
known as the Amsterdam secretariat. It was i n charge of issuing the
ICL's bulletin in 1 93536.
47. "The ItaloEthiopian Conflict." By permission of the H arvard

College Library. Signed "Crux. " Translated for this volume from the
German b y M aria Roth. An excerpt from a letter to the IS. Although Italy
did not invade Ethiopia until O ctober 1 935, its campaign against
Ethiopia was intense by July.
48. Haile S elassie ( 1 8 9 1 - 1975), the Negus (emperor) of Ethiopia, was
driven from the country by the Italian conquest i n 1 936, and was restored
to the throne i n 1 9 4 1 , reigning until removed by a military coup s hortly
before his death. Benito Mussolini ( 18831945), the founder of Italian
fascism, had been a member of the antiwar win g of the SP in 1 9 1 4 . He
organized the fascist movement in 1 9 19, became dictator in 1922, and set
the p attern of repression on which the Germ an Nazis modeled their
regime. He was overthrown in 1 943 and executed by partis ans two years
later.
49. Francesco Crispi ( 1 8 1 9- 1 9 0 1 ) , at first a republican, became an
outspoken monarchist and was Italian premier, 18879 1 and 1 893-96. He
sought an Italian protectorate over Ethiopia and was deposed after the
Italian defeat at Aduwa in 1 8 9 6 .
50. "For Defense of Soviet Revolutionaries . " By permission of the

Harvard College Library. Unsigned. Translated for this volume from the
German by M aria Roth .
5 1 . Gregory Zinoviev ( 1 883- 1 936), the first head of the Comi ntern
( 1 9 1 9-26), helped Stalin initiate the crusade against Trotskyism in 1 923,
but blocked with the Left Opposition from 1 926 until he was expelled from
the party in 1 9 2 7 . He capitulated, was readmitted, but was expelled again
in 1932. He repented again, but in January 1 935 he and eighteen others
were convicted of plotting to kill Soviet leaders and of moral responsibili
ty for the murder of Kirov. Sentenced to ten years, h e became a victim of
the first big M o s cow show trial in August 1 936 and was executed. Abel
Yenukidze ( 1 8 77-1 937) became secretary of the All-Russian Central
Executive Committee of the Soviets in 1 9 1 8 . In M arch 1 935 he was
arrested and accused of immoral behavior. He was l ater executed as a
spy. Trotsky's article about him, "Behind the Kremlin Walls" (Janu ary 8,
1 938), is in Portraits, Political and Personal (P athfinder Press, 1 9 77).
52. One condition set by the WPUS National Committee for agreeing to
sign the Open Letter was the addition of some sentences dealing with the
U . S . The WPUS leadership at this time was l ocked i n a sharp dispute over
perspectives raised by a sectarian tendency led by Hugo Oehler, which
was opposed in principle to any entry into Social Democratic parties.
53. Jan Bur and A. J ohre w ere leaders of the German Trotskyists in
emigration. Fischer might be Ruth Fischer or O skar Fischer ( Otto
Sch uessler), anoth er leader of the German emigre Trotskyists and
Trotsky's secretary in Turkey and Mexico. O. Fischer and Johre broke
with the FI during or after World War II. Nicolle Braun was the
pseudonym of E rwin Wolf (see note 42).
54. Marteau was a Stalinist who had been an editor of L'Action
socialiste, published by the left wing of the Belgian Labor Party (POB). In
March 1935 the Belgian Bolshevik-Leninists, at a n ational conference,
voted to enter the P O B . A minority, led by Vereecken, which had opposed
the entry, left the organization.
55_ "Perspectives in Polan d . " Bulletin Interieur, ICL, no. 3, September

1 935. Translated from the French for the first edition of Writings 35-36 by
Fred Buchman.
56. In 1 933-35, the ICL sought to link itself with l eftward-moving forces
in various centrist organizations. Fusion of the American section with
A.J. Muste' s AWP in 1 934 and of the Dutch section with the asp in 1935
led to the formation of the WPUS and the RSAP.
57. The P O B ( Belgian Labor Party) was the Belgian section of the
Second International. After World W ar II it took the name of Belgi an
Socialist Party. Georges Vereecken ( 1 896- ) was the leader of a
group that split away from the ICL's Belgian section early in 1935, when
the section voted to enter the P O B . After rej oining i n 1936, Vereecken
split again in 1 938 in protest against the founding of the FI. He also
adhered briefly to the FI movement in Belgium twice in the post-war
p eriod, and wrote a book, published in England as The CP U in the
l'rotshyist Movement ( New Park Publications, 1976), purporting to show

that Stalinist provocateurs were responsible for most of his differences
with Trotsky and the FI in the 19:30s. (Although his name in this book is
spelled "Vereeken," the editors have here retained the spelling most
commonly used by the movement in the thirties and by Trotsky in his
articles.)
ilil. The Polish Socialist Party (PPS) was a nationalist organization
founded by pilsudski and others in 1892. In 1 906 a left wing split away; in
1918 the left PPS united with the Social Democrats of Poland and
Lithuania to form the Communist Party. The PPS was nominally in
opposition to Pilsudski after his coup in 1926, but did not conduct an
active fight against the regime. The Polish Bolshevik-Leninists entered
the PI'S in November 1935.
59. The Jewish Bund (General Jewish Workers Union of Lithuania,
Poland, and Russia) was part of the Russian Social Democratic Labor
Party until 1903, when it opposed Lenin's concept of a multinational,
democratically centralized party. When the party rejected the Bund's
demand for a federated party structure, in which the Bund would be in
charge of relations with Jewish workers, it split and became an
independent organization. In 1917 it sided with the MenshevIks against
the Bolshevik revolution. In the thirties the Bund in Poland could be
called a centrist group.
60. Jozef Pilsudski 0867-193;), a Polish nationalist, organized his
own army to fight against Russia during World War I, and was a leader
of counterrevolutionary interventionist forces during the Russian civil

war. He moved his troops into Warsaw in May 1926 and became virtual
dictator of Poland until his death.
61. "To Young Communists and Socialists Who Wish to Think." Young
Spartacus. November-December 19:35. This article was written in German
on the eve of the congress of the Socialist Youth of Copenhagen. Young
Spartacus was the monthly paper of the Young Spartacus League, the
youth group of the WPUS.
62. The Versailles treaty was imposed by the victors in World War 1.
It was based on heavy reparations payments by the defeated countries.
6:3. The Bataille Socialiste group had been the left wing in the SFIO
for many years. It was itself divided into a right wing led by Jean
Zyromsky (1890-1975), and a left wing, led by Marceau Pi vert (1895-
1958). Zyromsky advocated "organic unity" with the CP in the middle
thirties, and joined the CP after World War II. Pivert organized
Revolutionary Left in 1935, without breaking with the SFIO, and served
as an aide of Leon Blum when Blum became People's Front premier in
1936. After his group was ordered dissolved in 1937, he left the SFIO and
founded the pSOP (Workers and Peasants Socialist Party) in 1938. After
World War II he returned to the SFIO.
64. Trotsky analyzed the SAP resolution in "Centrist Alchemy or
Marxism'?" dated April 24, 1935, in Writings 34-35.
6fi. War and the Fourth International was published as a pamphlet
by Pioneer Publishers in July 1 9:34. Its full text is in Writings 33-34.
66. "A Report in Arbeiderbladet." Arbeiderbladet (Oslo), July 26, 19:35.

Translated from the Norwegian for the first edition of Writings 35-36 by
David Thorstad_ E ditor O . Kolbj ornsen was the author of this report; also
present at the interview and asking questions were Martin Tranmae.i,
Norwegian Labor Party leader, and Minister of Justice Trygve Lie.
Trotsky was to refer to this interview in a Norwegian court in December
19:36 to confirm his version of the conditions un der which the government
had granted him a visa (see "In Closed Court " ) . Arbeiderbladet was the
paper of th e Norwegian Labor Party.
67. Konrad Knudsen was the editor of a Norwegian socialist paper
and Trotsky's host whi l e h e was in Norway.
68. The Political Bureau was the ruling body of the Soviet CP.
although ostensibly it was subordinate to the Central Committee_
69. E douard D aladier ( 1 884-1970), a Radical Socialist, was French
premier from 1 9:33 until 1 934, when he resigned after an attempted fascist
coup d' etat. He was minister of war under Leon Blum. Later he bee amp
premier again and signed the Munich Pact with Hitler in September 19:1R
70. Old Bolsheviks were those who joined the p arty prior to 1 9 1 7, that
is, members o f the party's "Old Guard."
7 1 . Leon Kamenev ( 1 83:3- 1 9:36), with Zinoviev, supported Stalin's
campaign against Trotsky in 1923 but formed a bloc with Trotsky in 1 926
until he was expelled from the party in 1 927. He capitulated, was
readmitted , but was expelled again in 1 932. He repented again but was
made a defendant in January 1 935, accused of responsibility for Kirov's

murder. Imprisoned, he was again a defendant in the first big Moscow
show trial, and was executed.
72. Ivan Maisky ( 1 884- 1 975) was a prominent right-wi ng Menshevik,
hostile to the O ctober Revolution. He became Soviet ambassador to
Britain in the late twenties, after being a minister in the Siberi an White
anti-Soviet government of Alexander V. K olchak ( 1874-1920 ) , a com
mander o f one of the E astern counterrevolutionary fronts during the
Russian civil war.
73. " Wh o Defends Russia? Who Helps Hitler?" New International,

October 1935. Signed "L.T."
74. J o s eph J acquemotte became the le ader of the Belgian CP after
the O p positionists were purged in 1 928. Walter D auge was a leader of
the P O B left wing who became a member of the Belgian Trotskyist
movement and one of its leaders during the thirties. He was elected to the
International E xecutive Committee at the founding conference of the FI
and left the movement during World War II.
75. P aul V aillant-Couturier 1 1 892- 1 937) was a member of the French
CP's Central Com mittee.
76. Hoh enzollern was the name of the ruling family of Prussia and
Germany until 1 9 18.
77. Pierre Renaudel ( 187 1 - 1 935) was a l eader of the SFIO right wing
and of the "Neo-Socialists , " expelled at the end of 1933. Marcel Cachin
( 1 869- 1958), a right-wing Socialist and supporter of World War I , moved
into the CP with the SFIO maj ority in 1920, and became a leader of the
CP in 1 92 1 .
7 8 . Jacques D oriot ( 1 898- 1945), a French C P leader and mayor of
Saint-Denis, a left-wing industrial suburb of Paris , became an advocate of
a united front against fascism early in 1934, before Moscow did. When the
CP would not discuss his proposals, he m ade them publicly. Expelled
from the CP, he was associated for a while with the London Bureau, then
swung to the right and formed a fascist party in 1936. Albert Treint
( 1889- 1972) was a central leader of the French CP in the mid-twenties . As
a supporter of Zinoviev he defended the Russian United Opposition and
was expelled in 1 927. He collaborated with several oppositional groups,
including the French Communist League, to which he belonged for a
short time before he denied the proletarian class character of the Soviet
state and j oined a syndicalist group.
79. Philipp Scheidemann ( 1 865-1 939) was a leader of the right wi ng
of the German Social Democracy. He entered the government in 1918 and
with E bert presided over the crushing of the November 1 9 1 8 revol ution.
He led the Social Democracy in the Reichstag until 1933. The argument
Trotsky paraphrases here was advanced by Scheidemann and the others
he mentions with relation to th eir own bourgeois governments during
World War I.
80. Stalin's infamous declaration at the end of his negotiations wi th
Laval in May 1 935 stated that he "understands and fully approves of the
policy of national defense made by France in order to keep its armed
strength at the level of security. "
8 1 . The P aris Commune was the first example o f a workers'
go vernment. It was in power M arch 1 8-May 28, 1 87 1 , just eventy-two
days, before it was overthrown by the Versailles army at the price of
30,000 dead.
82. Bonapartism was a central concept in Trotsky's writings duri ng
the 1930s. He used the term to describe a dictatorship, or a regi me with
certain features of a dictatorship, during periods when class rule is not
secure. It is based on the military, p olice, and state bureaucracy, rather
than on parliamentary p arties or a mass movement. Trotsky saw two
types-bourgeois and Soviet. His most extensive writings on bourgeois
Bona p artism are in The Struggle Against Fascism in Germany (Pathfind
er, 1970). His views on Soviet B o napartism reached their final form in his
essay "The Workers' State, Thermidor and Bonpartism , " reprinted in
Writings 3435.
83. The People's Front (or Popular Front) was the name given in
1 935 to the coalition of the French workers ' parties (Com munist and
Socialist) with the bourgeois Radical Party, on a program of liberal
capitalism. The Radical and Socialist p arties had formed such a coaliti on
in the twenties, which the Communist International had condemned as
class collaboration. What was new in 1935, in addition to the name, was
the CP's endorsement of and active p articipation in the co alition. People's
Frontism became official Comintern policy at its Seventh Congress in

August 19:1;:;, but it was adv anced by the French CP beginning in l ate
19:14. It remained the policy of all Stalinist parties until 19:19, when the
Stalin-Hi tler pact was signed. It was revived under different n ames
(anti m o n opoly coalition, etc. ) after World War I I .
84. L'Humanite was t h e newspaper of the French C Po
85. On February 6, 1934, French fascists and royalists attem pted to
overthrow the government through a demonstration at the Chamber of
Dep uties, where fo urteen people were killed and hun dreds wounded.
Daladier's government fell the next day.
86. De Wendel, Schneider, Rothschild, and Mercier are symbolic
of the big businessmen and industrialists who con trol the French
econo my and government.
S7. Edouard Herriot ( 1 87 2-1957) was the leader of the French Radical
Party who was most prominently identified with the policy of seeking
alliances with the Socialist Party in the 1920s. He was president of the
Chamber o f Dep uties, 1936-40. A leader of the Radical center, he was at
first cool to the People's Front, unlike Daladier, who was a leader of the
Radical left. Trotsky's 1935 pamphlet, Edouard Herriot, Politician of the
Golden Mean, is in Po rtraits, Political and Personal.
88. Sacred union is the French expressio n for wartime class coll abora
tio n .
89. Klement Gottwald ( 1 896- 1953) w a s a member of t h e Czechoslova
kian CP from its fou n ding in 192 1, and a member of its Central
Committee from 1925. He became a member of the Executive Committee
of the C o mintern at its Sixth World Congress in 1928. He was president of
the Czech republic from 1948 until his death.
90. Jacques Duclos ( 1 896- 1975), a m e mber of the CP from 1920,
became a m ember of its C entral Committee in 1926 and remained in its
top leadership until his death.
9 1 . Maurice Thorez ( 1900- 1964) sympathized briefly with the ideas of
the Left O p p osition in the m i d-twenties, but went on to become secretary
general of the CPo After World War II he w as a minister in the Gaullist
government.
92. " Oehlerism and the French Experienc e . " International Information
Bulletin, Workers Party, no. 2 , September 7 , 1935. Oehlerism ( after Hugo
Oehler, a m ember of the Workers Party National Committee) was an
expressio n of factional sectarianism inside the American Trotskyist
movement. The Oehlerites held that entry into a Social Democratic party
violated revolutionary principles, and that they could not be bound by the
discipline of any party that condoned such entrism. They were expelled in
October 1935 for issuing a public periodical without party permission.
93. Arne Swabeck ( 1 890 ) was a founder and leader of the
American C P and the C LA. In the CLA's e arly years he served as
national secretary and w as its delegate to the first intern ational
conference of the ILO, held in Paris in 1 933. He became a Maoist in the
1960s and left the Socialist W orkers Party in 1967. The June plenum of
the WPUS was a week"long meeting of the National Com mittee where the
issues raised by Oehlerism were fo ught o ut.
94. The Mulhouse congress of the SFIO took place June 9- 1 2 , 1 935,
shortly after the conclusion of the Stali n-Laval pact. The Bolshevi k
Leninists had three delegates whose vigorous activity forced the other
ten d en cies to debate their views, but they were politically isolated at the
congress, which was l argely devoted to h ailing the People's Front.
95. Fred Zeller ( 1 9 1 2- ) was the l eader of the Young Socialists of
the Seine, wh ere he was i nfluenced by the Bolshevik-Leninists. Expelled
in J uly 1 935, h e p articipated in the formation of Revol utionary Left. In
November he visited Trotsky i n Norway, from where he sent a postcard
that became the focus of a new Stalinist frame-up (see " O n the Postcard
Amalgam" ). His p a mphlet on the lessons of the SFIO expulsions, The
Road for Revolutionary Socialists, with an introduction by Trotsky, was
published by Pioneer Publishers in New York ( 1 935). He became
international youth secretary of the ICL and a leader of the French party
and its youth affiliate until 1 937, when he was expell ed for illicit dealings
with the Stalinists. H e later became a Freemason and an artist.
96. The International Bureau of Revolutionary Youth Organizations
was founded in February 1 934 at a conference, begun i n Holland and
completed in Belgium, "to work toward the creation of a new internation
al youth organization. " Its main organizations were the youth affiliates
of the ICL and of various centrist groups. It set up a Youth Bureau in
Stockholm, which soon became paralyzed because of differences over
perspective, particularly as the SAP tendency and its allies in the Youth
Bureau hardened in their opposition to the need for a new I n ternational.
Despite protests from a number o f Youth Bureau affiliates, the I C L
representative (Walter Held) w a s expelled from t h e Bureau in August
1 935. The organization folded up shortly thereafter.
97. Mot-Dag (Toward Day) was a Norwegian centrist youth group that
had been expelled from the Norwegian Labor Party (NAP) in 1925, but
rej oined it in 1 936. When the NAP came to power in 1 935, Mot-Dag
s upported its government and also endorsed Stalin' s s tatement s upport
ing French rearmament.
98. Erwin Bauer, a former member of the IS, broke from the ICL in
opposition to the French section's entry into the SFIO. I n October 1934 he
j oined the SAP .
99. "A Cancer in the Workers P arty. " International Information

Bulletin, Workers P arty, no. 2, September 7 , 1 935.
1 00. When th e Fren ch Bolshevik-Leninists voted to enter the SFIO in
August 1934, two groups split over th e i s s ue. One was the group around
Pierre Naville ( 1 904- ) , a cofounder of La Verite and the Communist
League. N aville's group entered the SFIO shortly after the maj ority.
Although they were not formally reunified until September 1 935, Naville
was one of the GBL spokesmen at the Mulhouse congress (June 1 935).
Naville was a member of the IS until World W ar I I , when he dropped out
to join a series o f centrist groups. The other group that split at the
prospect o f entry was the Lhuiller group. By far the most intransigent
opponent of the entry , Lhuiller entered the SFIO a year after his former
comrades; but he rem ained in the SFIO after they were expelled.
1 0 1 . Leon Lesoil ( 1 892-1942), a founder of the Belgian C P and a
member of its Central Committee, helped organize the Belgian section of
the Left Opposition and remained one of its leaders for the rest of his life.
Arrested by the Gestapo in June 194 1 , he died in a concentrati on camp.
102. The Intern ational C ommunist League of Belgium was the
name of the ICL's Belgian s ection before its entry into the P O B .
103. The Mensheviks were Russian Socialists w h o believed that the
working class must unite with the liberal bourgeoisie to overthrow
czarism and establish a democratic republic. The Mensheviks were
formed after a split in the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party in
1 903, and remained in the Second Intern ational. Yuri Larin ( 1 882- 1932)
was a promin ent Menshevik who led a movement toward the B olshevik
Party in 1 9 1 7 . During the twenties he worked as an economist.
1 0 4 . M ax S h achtm an ( 1 90 3- 1 972) was a l eader of the American CP
and a founder of the CLA. In 1 940 he split from the SWP because of
differences over the defense of the Soviet Union. In 1 958 he j oined the
Socialist P arty .
1 05. The WPUS's Control Commission sought to track down the
truth about a series of charges that Cannon and Shachtm a n were
conspiring behind the p arty' s back with l eaders of the SP to liquidate the
WPUS into the SP.
106. Thom as Stamm was a young Oehlerite in the WPUS leaders hip.
He j oined with Oehler in founding the Revolutionary Workers League
after they were expelled from the WPUS.
107. J ack Weber and Albert Glotzer ( 1 9 0 8- ) were members of
the WPUS National Committee aligned with M artin Abern in an anti
Cannon faction in 1935. Although they rej ected Oehler's politics , they
were willing to make blocs with him and with the group headed by A.J.
Muste i n order to put the C a nnon group in a minority on the NC. Weber
broke with Abern and Muste in 1 936 when the W PUS voted to j oi n the SP;
Glotzer opposed the entry but went along with it. Glotzer left the SWP
with Shachtman in 1 940. Weber left it at the end of World War II.
108. "Preface to P.J. Schmidt's Article on Holland." Bulletin, ICL,

September 1 , 1 935. Translated for this volume from the French by D avid
Keil. The article was entitled " O n the Relations of the RSAP of Holland
with the ICL and the Amsterdam Bureau . " The Amsterdam Bureau
was also known as the London Bureau, or London-Amsterdam B ureau
(International Bureau of Revo lutionary Socialist Parties), established in
1935. It was a loose association of centrist p arties not affiliated to either
the Second or the Third Intern ationals but opposed to the formation of a
Fourth International. Among its members were the German SAP, the
British I ndependent Labour P arty, and later the Sp anish POUM.
1 09. The O S P was the Independent Socialist Party of Holland, which
in 1935 merged with the Revolutionary Socialist P arty (RSP) to form the
RSAP, the Dutch section of the I CL. The Jordaan events were massive
demonstrations of workers in July 1934, in the working class district of
Jordaan in Amsterdam, in response to the announcement that the Dutch
government was lowering the already low dole payments. Order was
restored by the army after two nights of fighting. At least one OSP
member was killed and others were arrested. De Kadt, the P:H "ty secretary
and editor of its paper De Fakkel (The Torch), denounced the workers'
actions and tried to get the party to capitulate before the repression. H e
resigned, rejoined, a n d w a s expelled at t h e party conference o f September
1934.
1 l 0 . Adolphe was Rudolf Klement (1910-1938), Trotsky' s secretary in
Turkey and France and a member of the IS. He w a s kidn apped and
murdered by the GPU in P aris shortly before the FI's fo unding
conference.
111. "An Appeal to O ehlerite Comrades." From the archives of J ames

P. Cannon. By p ermission of the Library of Social History in New York.
112. Revolution was the newspaper of the Young Soci alists of the
Seine, begun under the influence of the Bolshevik-Leninist youth . After
the expulsion of th e Seine leadership, it became the paper of the
Trotskyist youth.
113. "Letter to the German Commission . " From a b ulletin published by

the German Commission of the ICL, November 1935. Signed " Crux."
Point 3 of this letter appeared in E nglish in New International,
September 1946, under the title "The Ch urch Struggle Against Fascism. "
The translation of th at section has been corrected , and the rest of the
letter tran slated for this volume from the German by Russell Block. In the
third year of their rule, the German Nazis, having wiped out all other
non-Nazi political, economic, and cultural organizations, began to crack
down hard on the Catholic and Protestant churches. The IKD (Intern a
tionalist Comm unists of Germ any) , German section of the ICL, supported
the church resistance against the Germ an govern ment as part of its
defense of democratic rights. The I K D ' s Emigre Committee, consisting of
the section's exiled leadership, met strong opposition to its point of view
from members of other European sections, including ultraleftists who
accused the IKD of betraying the proletarian class standpoint. At
Trotsky's suggestion, the ICL set up a German Commission to investigate
the German situation and the IKD's policy, and his letter here was
written after reading the minutes of the Germ an C o mmissi on's disc us
sions and its documents. In it Trotsky sought to elimin ate the heat in the
controversy, but definitely su pported the IKD's position. Some confusion
might arise from the fact that anal ogies with Fre n c h poli tics are used
without explicit explan ations. The editors have tried to clarify this by
usinf.{ s q u are brackets [ I to clarify the mean i n f.{ where it appears
con fusing.
1 1 4 . Wilhelm Pieck ( l il7fi- 1 960) was an official of the German CP from
its founding and went into exile after H i tler's victory. I-I e spent World
War II in Moscow and then returned to East Germany, where he headed

the Socialist Unity Party.
1 1 5 . Paul von Hindenburg ( 1 847-1 934) was president of Germany
from 1 925 until his death. Although he ran as an opponent of the Nazis
when he defeated Hitler at the polls in 1 932 , he appointed Hitl er
chancellor in 1 93.3 .
1 1 6. D avid Lloyd George ( 1 863- 1945) was Liberal prime minister of
Britain, 1 9 1 6-22, and coauthor of the Versailles treaty.
'
1 1 7. The IKD described its support of the ch urch struggle as
"unconditional," and refused to compromise on that word. Leon Sedov ,

Trotsky's son and a member of the German Commission, agreed with the
IKD position , his only obj ection being to its insistence on " unconditi onal" '
support.
11 8 . "The Comintern's Liquidation Congres s . " Biulleten Oppozitsii, no.

46, December 1 935. Signed "L.T. " Translated for the first edition of
Writings 35-36 from the Russian by John F airlie. Biulleten Oppozitsii
(Bulletin of the Opposition) was a Russian-language publication edited by
Trotsky, which printed the most important p ublic documents of the
Opposition and practically all of Trotsky's im portant pamphl ets and
articles during his last exile . It was first published in Paris, 1 929-3 1 , and
then was shifted to Berlin, w h ere the Nazis banned it when they came to
power in 1 933. Thereafter it was published in Paris until 1 934, Zurich
until 1935, Paris until 1 939, and New York until 194 1 , when it ceased
publication. A complete set in four volumes, with all of Trots ky's articles
identified (including those that were unsigned or signed with pen names) ,
h a s been p ublished b y Monad Press, N e w York, 1 973.
1 1 9. Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel ( 1 770- 1 8 3 1 ) , the most eminent
German philosopher of the first half of the nineteenth century, developed
the system o f dialectics that M arx later adapted to historical materi alism.
1 20. J e an Jaures ( 1 859- 1 9 1 4) was a founder of the Socialist P arty of
France and a pacifist. H e was assassinated at the start of World W ar I.
1 2 1 . Jules Guesde ( 1 845- 1 922) founded the French Workers Party and
introduced Marxism into France . In 1905 his group and the Soci alist
Party of France, led by Jaures, unified to become the SFIO. A supporter of
World War I , he became minister of state, 1 9 1 4- 1 6. He remained with the
minority of the SFIO after the maj ority split to form the CPo
1 22. The E ntente , or alliance , between France, Russia, Britain, and
Serbia went to war against Austria-Hungary and Germany in August
1 9 1 4 . The new Soviet government withdrew from the E ntente after the
O ctober Revolution.
123. Aristide Briand ( 1 862-1932) was expelled from the Socialist Party
in 1 906 for accepting a cabinet post in the Clemenceau government. He
organized the bourgeois Republican Socialist Party in 1 9 1 1 and was head
of the wartime coalition cabinet, 1 9 1 5 - 1 7 .
1 24. Georgi Dimitrov ( 1882- 1 949), a Bulgari an Communist w h o had
moved to Germany, attracted world attention in 1 933 when the N azis
imprisoned and tried him and others on charges of having set the
Reichstag on fire. He defended himself courageously at the trial and was

acq uitted . He became a Soviet citizen, served as executive secretary of the
Comintern from 1 934 to 1 943, and was the chief proponent of the People' s
Front policy adopted at the Comintern 's Seventh Congress in 1 935. He
was premier of B ulgaria, 1 946-49.
1 25. The Jacobins were the most radical political faction in the Gre at
French Revolutio n and dominated French politics from the overthrow of
the Gironde in 1 79 1 until they were defeated by a reactionary wing of the
revolution. As used here, the term "Jacobin" means the most incorrupt
ible revolutionary.
126. Following a gigantic demonstration by the People's Front in Pari s
on July 1 4 , the L a v a l government passed a series of deflation ary "decree
laws , " slashing s al aries of all civil service employees and putting extra
surcharges on gas, electricity, coal, and bread. These laws were extended
on August 8. The result was bloody cl a shes in early August between the
police and seamen and workers in France's big naval armories and
seaports in Toul o n , B rest, Cherbourg, St. Nazaire, and Le Havre.
Government troo p s killed five and wounded hundreds of strikers, some of
whom armed themselves and returned the fire. These struggles foreshad
owed the mass sitdown strikes less than a year later.
1 27. "To the Editors of Action Socialiste Revol utionnaire. " Bulletin,
ICL, Septem ber 1 , 1 935. Signed " Crux." Translated for this volume from
the French by Dan Rosenheim. Action Socialiste Revolutionnaire
was the revoluti o n ary s uccessor to Action socialiste. Its name was
changed when Marteau, a Stalinist agent in the P O B , began putting out
his own periodical entitled Action socialiste, distributed by members of
the C P o
1 28. "A Case for a Labor Jury." N e w Militant. October 5, 1 935. Signed
"L.T."
1 29 . Sergei Kirov ( 1 886- 1934) was a member of the Central Committee
of the CPSU from 1 9 2 3 and was p arty secretary in Leningrad from 1 926.
His assassination signaled the start of the purges that culmin ated in the
Moscow trials and the extermination of the entire remaining leadership of
the Russian revolution. The assassin, Leonid Nikol aev, was tried behind
closed doors and shot in December 1 934. The assassination evidently
resulted from bungling on the p art of the Soviet secret police during an
effort to manufacture a plot that could be used to smear Trotsky as a
terrorist. Many of the details are still un known to the p ublic, despite the
fact that Nikita Khrushchev exposed the official version as a frame-up in
his famous speech to the Twentieth Congress of the CPSU in 1 956.
l aO. Jean Rous ( 1 908 ) was a leader of one of the three factions in
the GBL. In 1 936 h e was the I S delegate in Spain. At the FI's fo undi ng
conference in 1938, he was elected to the International E xecutive
Cummittee. In 1 939 h e led a minority of the Fre nch party into the PSOP
(Wurkers and Peasants Socialist Party) . He left the FI after World War I I
began and j uined t h e SFIO.
Notes for Pages 91-1 1 0 521
1 3 1 . Amadeo Bordiga ( 1889-1 970), a founder of the Italian CP, was

expelled on charges of " Trotskyism" i n 1 929. The ILO tried t o work with
the Bordigists but failed because of the latter's sectarianism: they
opposed the tactic of the united front, for example, on principle.
1 32. "An Appeal. " Biulleten Oppozitsii, no. 45, September 1 935, where
it was called "From the editors of the Biulleten." Translated from the
Russian for the firs t edition of Writings 35-36 by Fred Buchman.
1 33 . The first expulsions of Trotskyists took place on July 30, 1 935, at
the Lille congress of the Socialist Y outh. The thirteen expelled were the
leadership of the S ocialist Youth of the Seine, most of whom were
Bolshevik-Leninists.
134. "How History and Biography Are Written." New Militant, October
12, 1 935. Signed "Alfa. " Translated from the Russian by John G . Wright.
135. Pravda is the official paper of the CPSU. Frederick Engels
( 1 820- 1 895) was the lifelong collaborator of Marx, cofounder of scientific
socialism, and leader o f the First and Second International s .
1 3 6 . Marx and E n gels wrote the Communist M anifesto in 1 847. I n
1 848 struggles for b ourgeois democratic rights, nation al independence,
and constitutional reforms took place throughout Europe.
1 37. Otto von Bismarck ( 1 8 1 5- 1 898) became head of the Prussi an
government in 1862, a n d was the first chancellor of . th e German empire.
His career was a long campaign to u nify Germany under Prussia and the
Hohenzollerns.
1 38. Karl Kautsky ( 1 854 1938) was regarded as the o utstandi ng
Marxist theoretician after Engels until W orld War I, when he abandoned
internation alism and o pposed the O ctober Revolution. Ferdinand
Las s alle (1825- 1 864) w as a m aj or figure in the German w orking class
movement, and founder of the German W orkers' Union. His followers
j oined the early M arxists in founding the Germ an Social Democracy. His
theory of the single undifferentiated reactionary mass lumped
together all classes outside the working c lass, failing to make distinctions
among them. It is discussed in Marx' s " Critique of the Gotha Program. "
1 3 9 . In 1891 Kautsky drafted the Erfurt program, which was the
model program for all the E uropean S o cial Democratic p arties, including
the Russian.
1 4 0 . Wilhelm Liebknecht ( 1826- 1 900) was a founder of the German
Social Democracy in 1 86 9 and a member of the Reichstag, 1 867-70 and
1874-1 900. He was imp risoned for two years for opposing the Franco
Pruss ian war.
1 4 1 . The Emancip ation of Labor Group was the first Russian Soci al
Democratic group, founded in 1883.
1 42. Georgi Plekhanov ( 1856- 1 9 1 8 ) , a founder of the E mancipation of
Labor Group, became a leader of the Menshevik faction i n 1 903. When
World War I began, he supported the czarist government, and l ater
opposed the Bolshevik revolution. The N arodniks (populists) were an
organized movement of Russian intellectuals who conducted activities
among the peasantry from 1876 to 1879, when they split into two groups .
One group was led by Plekhanov and split again, the Plekhanov group
becoming Marxists while the right wing evolved into the Social
Revolutionary Party.
1 43. Vera Zasulich ( 1 849- 1 9 19) was a prominent member of the
Narodniks and a cofounder of the Emancipation of Labor Group. In 1 903
she became a leader of the Mensheviks.
144. The Gotha Program, drafted as the program of the German
Social Democracy in 1 8 7 5 , was subj ected to heavy criticis m by M arx in
his pamphlet Critique of the Gotha Program, with a foreword by E ngels.
1 45 . D avid Zaslavsky ( 1880- 1 965) was a j ournalist on the Central
Committee of the Bund who came out against the Bolsheviks during the
October Revolution. He j oined the Bolshevik Party in 1924 and became a
well-known political writer on international questions .
1 46 . D avid Zaslavsky ( 1 870-1 938?) was the editor of the M arx-Engels
Institute's edition of E ngels's letters . A historian and phil osopher, he
j oined the Bolsheviks in 1 9 1 7. Although he later withdrew from politics,
his scholarly and scrupulous attitude toward party history m ade him
offensive to Stalin, w h o h ad him implicated in the 1931 trial of a so-called
Menshevik Center, accused of plotting to restore capitalis m in the USSR.
He was dismissed as director of the M arx-Engels Institute and exiled.
147. Lenin's testament, written in December 1922 and January 1 923,
gave his final evaluation of the other Soviet leaders. Since it c alled for the
removal of Stalin from his post of general secretary, it was suppressed in
the Soviet Union until after Stalin's death . It is included now in volume
36 of Lenin's Collected Works. Trotsky' s 1932 essay on the suppressed
testament is in the collection Lenin's Fight Against Stalinism (Pathfinder
Press , 1975).
148. " Letter to the Emigre Committee of the IKD . " Informations
Dienst, n o . 10, February 1936. Translated for this volume from the
German by Maria Roth. Informations D i enst (Inform ation Service)
was the internal bulletin of the IKD in exile .
149. Unser Wort (Our Word) was t h e IKD's paper, published abroad
and smuggled into Germany.
150. "The Terror of B ureaucratic Self-Preservation . " N ew Militant,

November 2, 1 935, where it had the title " I n creasing Oppression the Path
of the Bureaucracy. " U n signed.
1 5 1 . A. Tarov ( 1 89 8- 1 9 4 2) was a worker of Armenian origin in the
Caucasus who j oined the Bolshevik P arty in 1 9 1 7 and took p art in the
civil war. In 1927 he was expelled from the p arty as an Oppositionist and
deported to Siberia. H e escaped first to Iran and then to Europe. During
World War II he fought as p art of an Armenian Communist resistance
group and was executed by the Nazis. His letter is in E n glish in New
Militant, October 1 9 , 1 935.
1 52. British and Russian trade union leaders formed the Anglo
Russian Trade Union Unity Committee in May 1 925 in order to
Notes for Pages 1 1 0-1 1 7 523
achieve trade union unity and combat the imperialist war d anger. The
British section of the committee included members of the General C ouncil
of the Trades Union C o n gress (TUC), the British labor federation, who
used it as a device to shield themselves against criticism from the left. It
was p articularly useful to them in the tense period before and during the
general strike called by the TUC in May, in solidarity with the British
miners ' strike. The Russians clung to the Anglo-Russian C o m mittee even
when the General Council betrayed the general strike, and it collapsed
only when the British walked out of it in September 1 9 2 7 . Sir Walter
Citrine ( 1 887- ) was the general secretary of the British TUC, 1926-
46. H e was knighted for his services to British capitalis m in 1 935 and
made a b aronet in 1 94 6 . Mikhail Tomsky ( 1 886-1936) was a right-wing
Bolshevik who opposed the O ctober 1 9 1 7 insurrection. As the head of the
Soviet trade unions and a member of the P olitburo, he worked closely
with Stalin in the m id-twenties, especially on the Anglo-Russian
Committee, until he j oined the right-wing fight against Stalin led by
Bukharin. He committed suicide during the first big Moscow trial .
1 53 . The Chinese revolution of 1 9 25-27 was crushed because the
Chinese C ommunists, under orders from Moscow, entered the bourgeois
nationalist Kuomintang (People's Party), which was led by Chiang Kai
shek, and subordinated the revolution to the interests of their coalition
with the Kuomintang.
154. Vyacheslav Molotov ( 1 890- ), an early supporter of Stalin
and a m ember of the C entral Committee from 1920, was president of the
Council of People's Commissars, 1 930-41 , and minister of foreign affairs
after Litvinov (beginning in 1 939). He was eliminated from the leadership
by Khrushchev in 1957 when he opposed "de-Stalinization . " Chiang
Kai-shek ( 1 887-1975), the right-wing military leader of the Kuomintang
during the Chinese revolution of 1925-27 , was h ailed by the S talinists as a
great revolutionary until April 1927, when he conducted a bloody
massacre of the Shanghai Communists and trade unionists. He ruled over
China until overthrown i n 1 949.
155. The first five year plan for economic development in the Soviet
Union, begun in 1928, proj ected a m o dest acceleration of industrial
growth and an irresolute policy toward the peasantry. Suddenly the
Political Bureau reversed its p osition and called for fulfilling the five year
plan in four years. The resultant speedup and forced collectivization of
the peasantry led to a period of economic chaos and great h ardship for
the popul ation.
1 5 6 . GPU was one o f the abbreviated names for the S oviet political
police; other names were Cheka, NKVD , MVD , KGB , but GPU is often
used in their place.
1 57. Thermidor 1 794 was the month in the new French calendar when
the revolutionary J acobins were overthrown by a reactionary wing of the
revolution that did not g o s o far, however, a s to restore the feudal regime.
Trotsky used the term as a historical analogy to designate the seizure of
power by the conservative S talinist bureaucracy within the framework of
nationalized property relations.
158. On June 30, 1 9 3 4 , Hitler launched the "blood purge" that wiped
out potential oppositional elements in the Nazi party and other bourgeois
groups in Germany.
159. In another translation, this p a ssage may be found in the Selected
Correspondence of Marx and Engels (Moscow, 1953).
1 60. Maximilien Robespierre (1 758-1 794) was the Jacobin leader of
the French government from 1 793 until he was overthrown by the
counterrevolution of the Ninth of Thermidor and guillotined.
1 6 1 . Stanislav Kosior ( 1 889- 1 9 3 ? ) , a secretary of the U krainian CP
Central Committee in the twenties, became a member of the Politburo in
1930, following the Sixteenth Congress . In 1938 he was removed from all
his posts and was soon lost in the purges.
1 6 2. This is a reference to two other Stalinist amalgams. A Latvian
consul was alleged to have had a role in the 1 934 Kirov assassination in
return for "a letter for Trotsky. " In 1 927, the GPU planted as an agent
provocateur in the Left Opposition a former officer of Wrangel's White
Guards. Stalin then denounced the Left Opposition 's "counterrevolution
ary activity" and "connections with imperialism . "
1 63 . Andrei Zhdanov ( 1 896- 1948), an ally of Stalin from 1923,
replaced the assassinated Kirov as secretary of the Leningrad party
organization in 1 93 5 , and was a member of the Politburo from 1 939. H e
died under mysterious circumstances.
1 6 4 . Lazar Kaganovich ( 1 893- ) was commissar of heavy indus-
try, 1 938-39, a member of the Central Committee fro m 1924, and a
member of the Politburo from 1930. In 1934 he became head of the CP
Control Commission responsible for purges. He was removed from all his
posts as an " anti party element" when Khrushchev took over the Soviet
leadership in the 1 9 5 0 s .
165. "The Revolutionary Internationalists N e e d Our H elp!" New

Militant, September 28, 1935. Unsigned.
1 66. Paul Lafargue (1842- 1 9 1 1 ) , an organizer of the early French.
M arxist movement, and Laura Lafargue ( 1842- 19 1 1) , M arx's daughter,
committed suicide to avoid the indignities of old age.
167. Chen Tu-hsiu ( 1 879- 1942) w a s a founder of the Chinese CP and
Left Opposition . For his revolutionary activity he was imprisoned by the
Kuomintang police from 1932 until 1 937. Broken in h ealth, he withdrew
from politics in 1 9 4 1 .
168. M . N . R o y ( 1 887- 1 953) w a s a leading Indian Communist who felt
that cooperation with bourgeois nationalist elements w a s indispensable
for the colonial independence movement; he also sympathized with the
views of the Russian Right Opposition. In later years he left the socialist
movement.
1 69. Leon Jouhaux ( 1 870- 1 954) was general secretary of the CGT
(General Confederation of Labor), the chief union federation in France,
1 909-40 and 1945-47. H e was a supporter of both world w ars and an
opponent of the Russian revolution.
Notes for Pages 1 1 8-136 525
170. "The Stalinist Turn . " New International, October 1 935.

1. Apparently Trotsky h ad promised to write another . article on the
Seventh C ongress of the Comintern for the "international press" ("The
Comintern ' s Liquidation Congress" was printed only in the Russian
Biulleten Oppozitsii) and had not gotten around to it until September 7.
1 72 . Ercoli was the pseudonym of Palmiro Togliatti ( 1 893- 1 964), who
was elected to the Central Committee of the new Italian CP in 1 9 22 and to
the Executive Committee of the Comintern in 1 924. After his arrest and
release in Italy in 1925, he went abroad and in 1 926 was promoted to the
Secretariat of the E C C ! . He headed Comintern operations in Spain during
the civil war and returned to Italy in 1944 to head the CP until his death.
173. Otto Bauer ( 1 882- 1 938) was the chief theoretician of Austro
Marxism and a leader of the Austrian Soci al Democracy. Feodor D an
(1871-1 949) was a founder of the Russian Social Democracy and a
Menshevik leader of the Petrograd Soviet in 1917. He was a p acifist
during World War I and an active opponent of the Bolshevik revolution.
He was expelled from the Soviet Union i n 1 922. In 1 935, Bauer, Dan, and
Zyromsky issued j oint theses, entitled "Socialism and the War D anger, "
calling for support to the n ational bourgeoisie to defend the Soviet Union
and defeat Hitler. The theses were the Second International ' s equivalent
to the Comintern's People's Front policy and its qui d pro quo for organic
unity.
1 74 . The ILP (Independent Labour P arty) of England was organized
in 1893 and helped to found the Labour P arty , left it in 1932, and was
associated with the London Bureau until 1 939, when its leaders returned
to the Labour Party. I n 1 975 the remnants of the ILP changed its n ame to
Independent Labour Publications , a publishing group inside the Labour
Party.
175. " Russia and the World Proletariat." New International, October
1 935.
1 76. "The ILP and the Fourth International." New International,

December 1 935. The "Necessary Addition" was translated by Fred
Buchman for the first edition of Writings 35-36 from Bulletin Interieur,
ICL, December 1 935.
177. The Anti-Imperialist League, a proj ect of the Comintern, held
its first world congress in Brussels in February 1927 and its second and
last world congress in Frankfurt in July 1 929.
178. Trotsky's 1 933 articles and letters about and to the ILP are in
Writings 33-34.
1 79. Chartism (1 838-50) was a movement of revolutionary agitation
around the "people's charter , " a six-point p etition drawn up in 1 837 by
the London Workingmen's Association. It proposed, among other things,
universal suffrage and abolition of property requirements. Despite the
threat of a general strike, the House of Commons rejected the charter in
1839. The Belgian strike of 1893 was called by the POB on the demand
for manhood suffrage at twenty-five. It res ulted in m aj or changes in the

electoral law.
1 HO. Paul Faure ( 1 878- 1 960) was elected general secretary of the 8FIO
minority that opposed affiliation to the C o mintern in 1 920, and he headed
its ap paratus until World War II. I n 1 944 he was e xpelled for havi n g
collabora ted with the N a z i occupation government during t h e war. Jean
Baptiste Lebas ( 1 878- 1 944), a Socialist deputy, 1 9;t-40 , became a
minister in the People's Front government. He died in deportation .
Blanquism, after Louis-August Blanqui ( 1 805- 1 88 1 ) , is the theory of
arm!d ins urrection by small groups of s elected and trained conspirators ,
as opposed to the M arxist concept of m as s action.
1 8 1 . Weimar was the small town where the bourgeois democratic
government of the German Republic was organized i n 1 9 1 9 . The
bankruptcy of Weimar democracy paved the way for Hitler's accession to
power in 1933.
182. The M anifesto of October 17, 1905, signed by the czar,
proclaimed a constitution broadening the electoral laws and guaranteein g
general liberties, w h i c h were revoked after t h e revolution w a s crushed.
183. Dimitri Manuilsky (1883-1 952), like Trotsky, had been a member
of the independent M arxist group that fused with the B o lshevik Party in
1 9 1 7 . He supported the S talin faction in the 1 920s and served as secretary
of the Comintern from 1931 to 1943. Solomon Lozovsky ( 1 878- 1952)
was in charge of the Red International of Labor Unions and the ultraleft
tactics it imposed on Stalinist trade union work throughout the worl d
during the "third period."
184. In 1 923 a revolutionary situation in Germany developed out of a
severe economic crisis and the French invasion of the Ruhr. A maj ority of
the German working class turned toward s upport of the CP, but the CP
leadership vacillated, missed an exceptionally favorable opportunity to
conduct a struggle for power, and p ermitted the German c apitalists to
recover their balance before the year ended. The Kremlin's responsibility
for this wasted o p portunity was one of the factors that led to the
formation of the Russian Left Opposition at the end of 1 923. Heinrich
Brandler ( 1 881-1 967) was a founder of the German C P and its principal
leader when it failed to take advantage of the revolutio nary crisis of 1 923.
He was made a s capegoat by the Kremlin and removed from the party
leadership in 1924. He aligned himself with Bukharin's Right O pposition
in the USSR and was expelled in 1 929. H e maintained an independent
organization until World War II.
185. George Lansbury ( 1 859-1940) was a Labour member of the
British Parliament and a founder of the Labour Party' s newspaper The
Daily Herald. In 1 935 he opposed on p acifist grounds the League of
Nations sanctions against Italy for its invasion and occupation of
Ethiopia.
186. After the Italian attack on E thiopia in October 1 935, the Labour
Party and the C P called for a campaign of press ure on the Tory
government to force the Italians to stop their aggression through a policy
of " sanctions" (coercive measure s , such as blockade or boycott) by
Notes for Pages 1 3 7-158 527
mem bers of the League of N atio ns. The ILP itself was divided over the
question of sancti o n s . Part of the I LP incl uding the Trots kyists called for
the workers to take organized direct action to prevent s upplies and
assistance from getting to Italy and to refuse to make or handle war
goods for Italy ( " w orkers' sanction s " ) . Fenner Brockway initially
supported this positi o n , but he later capitul ated to the pacifist policy of
ILP leaders Maxton a n d McGovern, w h o argued against both workers'
sanctions and League o f Nations sanctions, saying that Ethiopi a was
j ust as bad as Italy.
1 87. Ellen Wilkinson (1891-1 947) w a s a Labour Party MP in the
thirties. She had been a Communist in the early twenties, but l ater
became an anti- C o m munist and hel d posts in the wartime coalition
government.
188. James Maxton ( 1 8851946) was the principal leader of the ILP in
the thirties. His pacifism led him to h ail Ch amberlain ' s role at Munich in
1938. Fenner Brockway (1890- ) , an opponent of the FI a n d
secretary of t h e L o n d o n Bureau, was als o an I L P leader.
189. E . Robertson was E arle Birney, a member of the W orkers Party
of Canada who spent some time in England working in the ILP with the
British Trotskyists. In November 1 935 he visited Trotsky in Norway and
discussed the prop o s al for an early turn to the Labour P arty . Interviews
from that visit are p ublished in this volume. He left the FI in 1 940 and
later became poet l a ureate of Canad a.
190. " For Practical Steps Toward Rapprochement. " From the archi ves
of James P . Cannon. By permission of the Library of Social History in
New York. Translated for this volume from the French by Naomi Allen. A
letter to Georges Vereecken.
1 9 1 . " Sectarianism , C entrism, and the Fourth Internati onal." New

Militant, January 4, 1 936.
192. Stalin's famous formula during t h e "third period" held that
Social Democracy and fascism were not antipodes (oppc>sites) but twins.
193. Trotsky was in error here about the origins of Que Faire? (What
Is To B e Done?). It actually began in 1934 as a small centrist group in the
French C P which distributed a bulletin with that title advocating a united
front with the SFIO. Later it was j oined by ex-Trotskyists l i ke Pierre
Rimbert and Kurt Landau. Its chief leaders, Andre Ferrat and Georges
Kagan , were expelled from the CP in 1 936. Que Faire ? became a
magazine, published until 1939. Most of its members j oined the SFIO and
the Bataille socialiste tendency in 1 938, where they supported organic
unity.
1 9 4 . L'Internationale was the j ournal of the Union Communiste, a
sect created in 1 933 after a split from the French CP in 193 1 . La
Proletaire d'Avant-Garde was a bulletin published by a small group
that left the French section after it decided to enter the SFIO in 1934.
195. B.J. Field was expelled from the CLA after violating p arty dis
cipline in 1934. He organized the League for a Revolution ary Workers
Party , which soon d i s a p p e ared. Albert Wei sbord ( HJOO- ), w h o was
exp e l led fr om the American CP i n 1 92 9 , organized a s m al l gro up, the

C o m m u n i s t Lea g u e of Stl'Uggle, w hich pr o c la i m e d its a d herence to the
1LO i n the early thirties al though its p o l itics vacillated between those of
the I{igh t and Left O p p ositio n s . H e later b r o k e with Marxism and became
an A F 1 . urga nizer.
1 9G . The fo rmer leader of t h e OSP's youth gro u p , ,Jan M o l enaar, w a s
a mem her o f the R S A P ' s P a rty Burea u a n d the l e a d e r of i ts u n i fi e d youth
orga n i zatioll . t Ill' RSJV ( Re vol ution a ry Soci a l ist Youth League). In
October 1 9:G h e led a split from the RS,J V because h e w a s o p posed to
associ ating it w i th the Open L e tter for the Fourt h In t e rn a tional. The s plit.
l ater s pread to t.he RSAP. M ol e n aar died in a Nazi c o n e e n trati , ) n c a m p
during t h e war.
un . E duard Bernstein ( 1 8 50 - 1 9 3 2 ) w a s the leading theoretician of
revisionism i n th e German Social D em o c r a c y . He held t h at Marxism was
n o l o n ger valid and had to b e "revised " ; socialism would c o m e a bout not
th ro ugh class s truggle and revol ution but through the grau u a l reform of
('apitalism achieved by parliamentary m e a n s . H e there fore advocated
class coll aboratio n .
1 9H. " Ro m a i n Rolla n d E xecutE's a n Assig n m e n t . " New International,

December 1 9: 3 G . R o m a i n Rolland ( l 8Gn- 1 9 4 4 ) , a novelist and uram ati st,
was a leading spirit. of the " left" after his p a ci fist denunci ation of World
War I . I n h i s l ater y e a r s h e l e n t h i s n anw to Stalinist literary congresses
and manifestos .
1 9 9 . Mohandas G an d h i ( l H69- 1 94 8 ) w a s t h e leader of t h e Indian
N ati o n a l Congress, a n ationalist movement that became the Congress
Party o f India. He o r g a nized massive o p p osition to Briti s h rule, but
insisted o n pe aceful , n o n violpnt, passive resistance metho d s .
200. Henry Yagoda ( 1 8 9 1 - 1 938) was t h e h e a d of the Soviet secret
police u n til h e was h i m s e l f m ade a defend a n t and shot.
201. Kurt Rosenfeld ( 1 8 7 7- 1 943) w a s a well-known ci vil li berties
lawyer and a left-wi n g l e ader of the German Social Dem ocracy who was
expelled in 1 93 1 and helped fou n d the SAP, o f which h e was a l eader for a
short time.
202. White Guard s , o r Whites, w a s the name given the Russian
counterrevolution ary forces d uring the civil war.
203. Brest- Litov s k was a town o n the Russo-Polish border where a
trea ty ending hostil i ties b etween Russia and Germany was si gned i n
March 1 9 1 8 . T h e terms were exceedin gl y unfavorable to t h e n e w Soviet
gover n m ent, and there were sh arp differences among its l e aders about
w h ether to accept them until Le nin's proposal to do s o w as a d o pted.
204 . Stanley Baldwin 0 867- 1 947) was C o n servative prime minister of
Britain i n the twenties and 19:15-37.
205. Marcel M artine t ( 1 887- 1 94 4 ) , a wri ter, poet, and Socialist, left
political life in 1 923 because of i l l health . He d efended Trotsky when the
French govern m e nt was h o unding him out of the country. I n 1936 he
j oined the campaign a g ainst th e Moscow tri a l .
Notes for Pages 1 59-1 76 529
206. " Lessons of O c t o b er . " New Militant, N o v ember :30, 1 9:35. This
article w a s written for th e Fren ch p a p er Revolutiun, on the occasion o f
the a n n i ve r s a r y of the October Revolution . Zeller paid Trotsky a v i s i t in
N o rway i n N o v em b e r 1935.
207. The S ocial Revolutionary Party \ S R s ) was founded in Russia
in 1 9 0 0 , e m ergi ng i n 1 90 1 -0 2 as th e p o l i tic a l express i o n of all th e earlier
populist curren ts; it had the l a rg es t s h are of i n !1 u e n c e among the
peasantry pril)!- t o th e rev o l u ti o n i n 1 9 1 7 .
208. Th e R u s s ia n Consti tuti o n al D emocrats, c a l l e d Cadets, w e r e the
libenil party fa vori n g a c o n s t i t u ti o n al m o n archy i n Russia or e ve n
ultimately a r e p ublic. It was a party of progressive landlords , middle
bourgeois, and bourgeois i nt e l l e ct u als .
209. M a x i m Gorky ( 1 868- 1 93 6 ) , the Russian writer of p o p u l ar short
stori es, novel s , a n d plays, was hostile to the O ct o b e r Revolution i n 1 9 1 7
b u t gave s u p p o rt t o the Stalin g o v ernment.
210. "How Did S t a l i n Defe a t the O pp o sit i on ? " Biulleten Oppozits ii, no.
46, D e c e mb er 1 9:35 . Tr a n s l a t e d from the Russian for th e first editi o n of
Writin{?s 35-36 b y Fred B uchm a n . This reply to a l etter from Fred Zeller
was i n t ende d to refute the argum e n t , put forth by ce n trist s , that the
Trots kyist line was wrong, because otherwise Trotsky and not Stalin
would have emerged victorious in th e Soviet Union. This article was not
printed i n French for a whole y ear, until November 5 , 1936, when i t was
printed in Lutte ouvriere.
2 1 1 . Vladimir Potemkin ( 1878-1946), a former bourgeois profess or
who j oined the Bolsheviks in 1 9 1 9 , became head of the diplomatic corps
and assistant people's com m i s s ar of foreign affair s . Alexander Troya
novsky ( 1 88 2 - 1 955) was a prominent right-wing Menshevik, hostile to the
October Revolution , who denounced the Bolsheviks in the Constituent
Assemb l y in 1 9 1 8 as German agents. He later became Soviet ambassador
to the U.S., 1 934-39. Jacob Surits ( 1 881-1952) w a s Stalin's amb assador
first to Berlin and then to P ari s , and was one of the few diplomats to
survive the purges. Lev Khinchuk ( 1 86 8- ?) was a Menshevik from 1 903
until 1 920. H e then became ambassador first to England ( 1 926) and then
to Germ any ( 1 930).
212. Samuel Gompers ( 1 850- 1 924) was president of the American
Federation o f Labor from 1886 until his death. William Green ( 1873-
1952) succeeded him as its president. Theodor Leipart ( 1 867- 1 94 7 ) w a s a
German union leader who w a s minister of labol', 1 9 1 9 - 20 , and replaced
Karl Legien as head of the m ajor l abor federation, 1 930-32.
2 1 3 . The M arxist the o r y of permanent revolution elaborated by
Trotsky states, among other t.h ings, that i n order to a cc o mp li s h and
consolidate even bourgeois democratic tasks such as land r efor m in an
underdeveloped co un try , the revolution m u st go beyond the li mits of a
democratic revolution into a s o cialist one, which s et s up a workers' and
peasants ' government. Such a revolution will therefore not take place in
" stages" (first a stage of capitalist development, t o b e fol l o we d at some
time in the future by a socialist revolution ) , but will be continuous or
"permanent, " passing swiftly to a post-capitalist stage. For a full

exposition of the theory, see The Permanent Re volution and Results and
Prospects, by Leon Trotsky (Pathfinder Press, 1972).
214. Trotsky's 1 932 article " O n the Suppressed Testament of Lenin"
and Lenin's M arch 5, 1923, l etter to Stalin, threatening to break off
relations with him, are in Lenin 's Fight Against Stalinism.
215. Nadezhda K. Krupskaya ( 1869-1 939) was an Old Bolshevik and
the companion of Lenin. She played a central role in the underground and
the emigre organization of the Russian Social D e mocracy. She adhered to
the United O pposition for a brief time in 1926.
216. "A Venerable Smerdyakov." Biulleten Oppozitsii, no. 47, January

1936. Signed "Alfa . " Translated from the Russian for the first edition of
Writings 35-36 by John Fairlie. Smerdyakov is the fourth, illegitimate
brother in D ostoyevsky's The Brothers Karamazo v, the one who actually
murders the father. He is a repellent character, always whining, fawning,
and servile . Literally, the name m eans "Stinker . " "Venerable" refers
purely to Antonov-Ovseenko ' s age.
217. Yakov Sverdlov ( 1 885-1919) was president of the C e ntral
Executive Committee of the Soviets, secretary of the Bolshevik C e ntral
Committee, and president of the Russian Soviet Republic. Felix
Dzerzhinsky (18 77-1926) was a founder of the Social Democratic P arty
of Poland and Lithuania. In 1906 he was elected to the Bolshevik C e ntral
Committee. He became the first commissar for internal affairs and first
chairman of the Cheka (later called the GPU) . Andrei Bubnov ( 1 883-
1940), an Old Bolshevik, was o n the Military Revolutionary Committee
that organized the October insurrection. In 1 923 he lined up with Stalin.
He was a victim of the purges. Moisei Uritsky ( 1 873-1 9 18), was also on
the Military Revolutionary C o mmittee and l ater became head of the
Chp.ka in P etrograd.
218. Vladimir Antonov- Ovseenko ( 1 884-1938) was the secretary of
the Petro grad Soviet's Military Revolutionary Committee and played a
maj or role in the October 1 9 1 7 insurrection. An early member of the Left
Opposition, he capitulated in 1 927. He was Soviet consul general in
Barcelona during the Spanish Civil War. He was m ade a scapegoat for
th e defeat of Stalinist policy in Spain and disappeared.
219. Young Pioneers was the organization of those who were too
young to j oin the Communist Youth.
220. "Two Statements on the C annon-Shachtman Letter." From the

archives of James P. Cannon. These letters to the l eaders of the WPUS
concerned a l etter from Cannon and Shachtm an to the IS, dated August
15, 1935, offering their analysis of the factional situation in the WPUS.
Although C annon and Shachtman had not submitted it for publication,
the IS published it in an internal bulletin. Following the indignant
response of Weber and Glotzer, the WPUS N ational Committee reprinted
the C annon-Sh achtman letter alongside replies by Weber and Glotzer in
International Information Bulletin, no. 3, February 12, 1936. "An Obvious
Notes for Pages 1 78-1 85 531
Error" was published in Bulletin Interieur, ICL, no. 4, January 1 936,

which also contained an IS statement regretting the misun derstanding.
22 1 . " Factions and the Fourth International." By permission of the

Harvard College Library. Translated for this volume from the Russian by
Marilyn Vogt. This article was not published anywhere. Trotsky seems to
have written it with two purposes in mind: to study s o me of the internal
problems of the FI and its sections; and to clarify some of the issues
raised by the expulsion of the French Bolshevik-Leninists from the SFIO.
222. By liquidationism Trotsky means the reluctance of some
Bolsheviks to resume the underground s truggle duri n g the years of
reaction ( 1907-14) and their desire to m ake it possible to work in the open
by diluting, or "liquidating," the revolutionary progra m s o i t would be
acceptable to the authorities. Alexei Rykov ( 1 8 8 1 - 1 938), an Old
Bolshevik, succeeded Lenin as president of the Council of People's
Commissars, 1924-30. A leader of the Right O pposition, h e was convicted
in the third Moscow trial and executed. LF. Dubrovinsky ( 1 877- 1 9 1 3)
was a member of the Central Committee after 1 903 and was one of the
organizers of the Moscow uprising in 1905.
223. Nikolai Bukharin ( 1 889-1939), a l eader o f the Right O pposition,
succeeded Zinoviev a s head of the C omintern, 1926-29. He capitulated i n
1929 after being expelled, but was a victim of the third M o s c o w trial. Yuri
Pyatako v (1890-1 937) played a leading role in the October Revolution
and civil war and held many key posts in the government. A Left
Oppositionist, he capitulated shortly after he was expelled in 1 927 and
was given important posts in industry, but was convicted in the second
Moscow trial and executed.
224. The February Revolution in Russia in 1917 overthrew the czar
and e stablished the b ourgeois Provisional Government, which held power
until the October Revolution brought the s o viets, led by the B olsheviks, to
power.
, 225. Emelyan Yaroslavsky ( 1 878- 1 943) was a top Stalinist specialist
in the campaign against Trotskyism and was part of the team that
brought charges against him and demanded his expulsion from the party
in 1 927.
226. The Democratic Centralism and Workers ' Opposition groups
in the Russian CP began in the early 1 920s and held semisyndicalist and
ultraleft views. Their leaders were expelled and exiled at the s a m e time as
the Trotskyists. The Workers' Opposition had held that the unions should
have sole charge of production .
227. The New Economic Policy (NEP) was adopted as a temporary
measure in 1921 to replace the policy of Military Communi s m , which had
prevailed during the civil war. The NEP allowed a limited growth of free
trade inside the Soviet Union and foreign concessions alongside the
n ationalized and state-controlled sections of the economy. It stimulated
the growth of a class of wealthy peas ants and of a commercial
bourgeoisie (NEPmen), and produced a long series of p olitical and
economic concessions to private farming and trade.
228. Wal-Wal was a village in southeast Ethiopi a, the scene of an

armed clash on December 5, 1 934, in an incident the Italians used as a
pretext for escalating their advance to war.
229. Louis-Olivier Fro ssard ( 1 889- 1946) was one of the leaders of the
SFIO supporting its affili ation to the Comintern in 1 9 2 0 , and then
general secretary of the new CPo He resigned from the CP in 1 923 and
later rej oined the SFI O , coming close to the right-wing Neo-Soci alists in
1933. He resigned in 1 9 3 5 to become minister - of labor. He was later a
minister in various People's Front cabinets and in the first Petain regime.
230. "An Answer to C omrades in Anvers . " From a mimeographed letter

or bulletin of the I S , issued on November 1 7 , 1935. Translated for this
volume from the French by Naomi Allen . Trotsky's answer was to a
group in Anvers who h a d sent the IS a resolution concerning relations of
the various groups i n B elgium. The Vereecken group was based in
Brussels; the group i n C h arleroi , headed by Leon Lesoil, was the center of
the official section, which had entered the P O B .
2 3 1 . "Tactical Questions and Splits . " International Information Bulle

tin, Workers Party, n o . 3, February 1 2 , 1 93 6 .
232. This is a reference to Ruth Fischer, w h o , although an opponent of
the entry, was on the I S .
2 3 3 . This is a reference to the motion offered b y Pivert at - the Lille
congress.
234. The Norwegian Labor Party (NAP), was the m aj or working
class party in Norway. It broke with the S econd International and
affiliated with the Comintern in 1 9 1 9 , then left the l atter in 1923. In the
mid-thirties it was associated with the London Bureau, but later it
returned to the Second International. In 1 935 it became the ruling party
in Norway and granted asylum to Trotsky, later- interning and silencing
him after the first M o s co w trial.
235. A. Hennaut was the head of the B elgian League of C ommunist
Internationalists, which had split from the Left Opposition in 1 930. In
1933 the Belgian section o pened unsuccessful negotiations for fusion with
Hennaut's group.
236. "Once Again the ILP . " New International, February 1 936. The
text of this interview with E. Robertson in the Trotsky Archives at
H arvard bears the notation "For Controversy" (the ILP's internal
discussion bulletin) . This talk took place a few weeks after the British
general elections, which the Tories won decisively. At this time, the
British section of the I C L was a faction inside the ILP (the Marxist
Group), seeking to win it to the Fourth International or to recruit workers
in it. The Marxist Group was divided over electoral policy in the general
elections. Its maj ority voted to call on the ILP to run as many candidates
as it c(mld and to boycott Labour Party candidates, except for those who
opposed League of N ations sanctions against Italy. Its minority wanted
to continue critically supporting all Labour Party candidates except
where the ILP was running candIdate s . Robertson's discussion with

Trotsky sought to clear up the matter of principle involved in the debate.
237. John McGovern ( 1887-1 968) was an ILP leader in the thirties,
leaving it in 1947. He went to Spain as a supporter of the PODM during
the civil war. In later years he became an anti-Communist. C ampbell
Stephen ( 1 884-1947) was a n ILP member and MP in 1935.
238. Herbert Morris o n ( 1 888-1965) was a right-wing Labour MP.
During World War II he was in the coalition cabinet, where he banned the
British Stalinist press and imprisoned Trotskyists. John R_ Clynes
( 1 869-1949) was a right-wing Labour MP for thirty-five years and a
member of the first two British Labour cabinets.
239. The Labour Party conference of 1935, held in Brighton, a p proved
a resolution supporting League of Nations sanctions against Italy after
long and heated debate.
240. Arthur Ponsonby ( 1 8 7 1 - 1946) was leader of the Labour P arty in
the House of Lords, 1 93 1-35. Sir Stafford Cripps (1889-1 9 5 2 ) was a
Labour MP and a leader of the Socialist League. He opposed the pro
sanctions policy of the Labour Party at its 1 935 conference. H e later
became a m ember of the w artime coalition government.
2 4 1 . Norman Angell ( 1 8 74-1 967), a pacifist writer and Labourite, was
co-president of the World C om mittee against W ar and Fascism and in
1933 was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
242. The Tories, or Conservatives, the p arty of the bourgeoisie,
emerged in England in the eighteenth century from the old royalist party
of the civil war, the Cavaliers.
243. Leopold C. Amery ( 1 873-1955), a Tory politician, was an MP for
thirty-five years and was colonial secretary, 1 924-25, and secretary of
state for India, 1940-50 .
244. Harry Pollitt (1890-1 960) and William Gallacher ( 1 8 8 1 - 1 965)
were leaders of the British CPo Gallacher was also an MP, 1 9 3 5-50.
245. The Socialist League was formed in the Labour Party i n October
1932 by former ILPers who disagreed with its disaffiliation from the
Labour P arty. Its secretary from 1934 to 1936 was J.T. Murphy , a former
. Stalinist. It also included Reg Groves and other former Trotskyists. It
opposed sanctions against Italy as a capitalist m easure. In 1 9 3 7 it agreed
to disband at the request of Labour Party leaders.
246. Friedrich Ebert ( 1 8 7 1 - 1 925) was a leader of the right wing of the
German S o cial Democracy. As chancellor, he presided with Scheidemann
over the crushing of the November 1 9 1 8 revolution , murderin g Lieb
knecht, Luxemburg, and others. He was president of the Weimar
Republic, 1 9 1 9-25.
247. The ILP Guild o f Youth was b oth a political and a cultural
youth organization. The Labour Party Leagu e of Youth was formed
in 1926 in response to the initial organizational successes of the ILP
Guild of Youth . In constant c onflict with the Labour Party over its rights
and prerogatives, it was fin ally able to establish a paper in 1 935 and have
representatives elected to the Labour Party's N ational Executive. But in
1936 it was again roughly subordinated to the Labour Party leadership.
248. The Spanish Workers and P e asants Bloc, also known as the
Catalan Federation, was a centrist group led by Joaquin Maurin, which
merged with the ICL's Spanish section in 1 935 to form the Workers Party
of M arxist Unification (POUM).
249. The Maximalists were a centrist tendency in the Italian SP
which continued activity in exile after Mussolini came to power. They
signed a common appeal with the SP and CP calling on the League of
Nations to extend s anctions against Italy for its aggression in Ethiopia.
250. The Austrian Red Front was a split-off from the Austrian Social
Democracy before the latter was outlawed in 1 934. They disbanded and
j oined the left Social Democratic Revolutionary Socialist Party before the
end of 1 935.
25 1 . The Polish Independent Labor Party was a small group
headed by Joseph Kruk, who l ater b ecame a Zionist.
252. The Swedish Socialist P arty was established by Karl Kilborn
and other former S wedish CP leaders as a Right O ppositionist group
when they refused to go along with the ultraleft turn of the Comintern in
1929. It was originally known as the Swedish Independent Communist
Party. In 1937 it split when Kilborn and his faction left and joined the
Social Democratic P arty.
253. Julian Gorkin, a leader of the Spanish CP, belonged to the Left
Opposition for a time before he j oined Maurin 's W orkers and Peasants
Bloc. He later became a leader of the PODM.
254. Revolutionary Left was organized by Marceau Pivert within the
SFIO at the end of S eptember 1935. It took over many of the slogans that
the GBL had popularized inside the SFI O , remaining, however, equivocal
on the question of the People's Front and silent on the question of the
need for a new International. While condemning the expulsions of
Bolshevik-Leninists from the SFI O , it pronounced against anything that
would stand in the way of reintegrating the expelled m embers back into
the SFIO, thus opposing independent political activity. The role
Revolutionary Left played was that of an obstacle to the formation of an
independent revolutionary party. B y setting itself u p a s an ostensibly
revolutionary wing in the SFI O , it gave a ready excuse to vacillatin g
elements t o remain in the S F I O , a n d provided left cover for the
bureaucracy by bolstering its claim that revolutionary elements had a
place in the S FI O .
255. Jay Lovestone ( 1898- ), a leader o f the American C P i n the
twenties, was expelled in 1929 shortly after the downfall of his
international ally, Bukharin. The Lovestoneites dissolved their organiza
tion at the beginning of World War II. Lovestone later became cold-war
adviser in foreign affairs for AFL- C I O President George Meany.
256. "Advice on C anadian Farmers . " Vanguard, February 1, 1936,

where the article was described as a condensation of some of Trotsky' s
remarks. Vanguard was the newspaper o f the Workers Party o f Canada.
This was another discussion with Robertson.
257. The Social Credit Party flourished in C anada's western

provinces during the Great Depression, especially in Alberta, where it
swept to power in 1935. It appealed to small farmers and small and
middle manufacturers with attacks on the growing centralization of
p ower in business , the state, and the trade unions . It preached monetary
reform and argued that the source of economic crisis lay not in capitalism
but in the control of credit by an irresponsible financial oligarchy.
258. "Rem arks in Passing. " Info rmations Dienst, n o . 1 0 , February

1 936. Translated for this volume from the German by Russell Block. The
"W" to whom this letter was addressed may have been Wolf Weiss, a
German emigre in Czechoslovakia who later wrote a book about the
Moscow trial.
259. This is a reference to Trotsky's article "The Workers' State,
Thermidor and Bonapartism," in Writings 34-35.
260. "On the Postcard Amalgam. " From the archives of James P .
Cannon. By permission o f the Library of Social History i n New York.
Translated for this volume from the French by Naomi Allen . Fred Zeller,
visiting Trotsky in Norway in early N ovember, had sent a postcard to a
Stalinist friend in P aris , saying "Down with Stalin . " On December 1 2 ,
A r beideren, the Norwegian CP p a per, featured a sensational story
outlining the " death plot" against Stalin centering around the Trotsky
household in Norway and dem anding to know what the Norwegian
Socialist Youth thought of the use of N orway as a base for terrorist
activity by people expelled from the French Socialist Youth . Arbeideren
was answered by s everal articles in the NAP press , defending Trotsky
and exposing the S talinist attempt to get the Norwegian government to
arrest Trotsky. (The Paris and New York Stalinist papers carried the
same charges and were answered by articles in Revolution and the Ne w
Militant.)
2 6 1 . Boris Souvarine ( 1 893- ) was a founder of the French C P
and o n e of t h e first serious biographers of Stalin. He was expelled from
the French party as a Trotskyist in 1 92 4 . In the 1 930s he turned against
Bolshevism. Alfred Rosmer ( 1 877- 1 964) was a friend of the Trotskys
from World War I and a member of the Left Opposition until 1930, when
he resigned because of political and organizational differences. He and
Trotsky became personally reconciled in 1 936.
262. Raymond Molinier ( 1 904- ) was a cofounder of the French
Trotskyist movement with whom Trotsky collaborated until 1 935, when
his group was expelled for violating discipline by publishing its own
newspaper, La Commune, the "mass paper . " Attempts at reunification
were made several times in the following years but proved unsuccessful
until the middle of World War I I .
263. Robert Louzon ( 1 882-1976) had been a n editor o f I 'Humanite
before he resigned from th e CP in 1924 to found Revolution proletarienne,
a syndicalist group .
264. " How Did Stalin Defeat the Opposition?" was never published in
Revolution. It was published in French only a year later, November 5,
1936, in L utte ouvriere.
265. "Request for a Month 's Leave of Absence . " From The Prophet
Outcast, by Isaac Deutscher ( 1963). This was a letter to Leon Sedov
( 1 906- 1938), Trotsky's elder son, who j oined the Left Opposition and
accompanied his parents in their last exile. H e was Trotsky's closest
collaborator, coeditor of the Biulleten Oppozitsii, and a member of the IS
until his death at the hands of the GPU. Trotsky ' s obituary for him is in
Writings 3 7-3S. It is not known whether Trotsky's request for a leave of
absence was formally granted. In any case, he continued to complain in
subsequent letters to Sedov about the "silly intrigues" of the "French
cliques . "
266. "For a Lucid E xplan ation . " From the archives o f James P .
Cannon . B y permission o f the Library o f Social History i n New York.
Translated for this volume from the French by N aomi Allen . A letter to
Georges Vereecken.
267. The expulsions of the Trotskyi sts from the POB took place in June
1936.
268. " D evelopments in the USSR. " Service de Presse, ICL, Jan uary 5,
1936. Signed " Crux. " Transl ated for this volume from the French by
Russell Block.
269. The first number of the special press service, entitled Service
d 'Information et de Presse sur l ' URSS (Inform ational Press Service on
the USSR), published by the IS, was dated J une 12, 1936.
270. The Stakhanovist movement was a special system of speedup in
Soviet production named after a coal miner, Alexei Stakh anov, who
reportedly exceeded his quota sixteen-fold by s heer effort. The system was
introduced in the Soviet Union in 1935 and led to great wage disparities
and widespread discontent among the masses. For his reward Stakhanov
was made a full member of the CP and a deputy to the Supreme Soviet of
the USSR. Sedov's article, "The Stakhanovist Movement, " appeared in
English in New International, February 1 936, under his pen name "N.
Markin . "
2 7 1 . "The Class Nature o f the Soviet State . " New Militant, June 6 ,
1936. The translation was corrected against the German original in
Informations Dienst, no. 10, February 1 936, by Rus sell Block and
Candida B arbarena.
272. Hugo Urbahns ( 1890- 1946), a leader of the German CP, was
expelled in 1928 and helped to found the Leninbund, which was
associated with the ILO until 1 930. He authored his own th eory about the
"state capitalist" nature of the USSR.
273. " Foreign Communists in Danger . " B y permission of the H arvard

Notes for Pages 21 9-231 537
C ollege Library. Translated for this volume from the German by M aria
Roth . Copies were sent to ICL leaders in several countries.
274. Anton Ciliga was a leader of the Yugoslav C P imprisoned by
Stalin who was allowed to leave the USSR in 1 935. H e revealed much
about conditions in Soviet prisons before breaking with M arxism.
275. "Notes of a Journalist." New International, February 1936. Signed

"Alfa . "
276. D emyan B e d n y ( 1 883- 1945), unofficial poet l aureate i n the Soviet
Union for many years, wrote propaganda poetry.
277. Black Hundreds was the p opular name for the gangs of
reactionaries and " patriotic" hoodlums that existed u p through the
Russian civil war. They were organized with the czarist government's
clandestine backing, and specialized in carrying out anti-Semitic pogroms
and terrorizing radicals.
278. Alexander K erensky ( 1 882- 1970) was one of the leaders of a
wing of the Russian Social Revolutionary Party. He was minister of
j ustice in the Provisional Government in March 1 9 1 7 . In May he took the
post of minister of war and the-navy, which he continued to hold when he
became premier. Later he appointed himself commander in chief as well.
H e fled Petrograd when the Bolsheviks took power.
279. Anthony Eden ( 1 897- 1 977), British Conservative and future
prime minister, was foreign secretary, 1 935-38.
280. Ernst Torgler ( 1 893- 1 963), the leader of the CP delegation in the
German Reichstag, was a defend an t in the Reichstag fire trial in 1933. He
was acquitted. In 1 9 3 5 he was expelled from the Germa n CPo During the
war he was in a Nazi concentration cam p . In 1 945 he j oined the West
German Social Democratic Party . M aria Reese was a CP deputy in the
German Reichstag who broke with Stalinism and j oined the Trotskyist
movement when she could not secure a discussion in the CP after Hitler
came to power. Soon after, however, she broke with M arxism altogether
and went over to the Nazis. Trotsky's preface to her pamphlet I Accuse
Stalinism is in Writings 33-34.
2 8 1 . Joseph Goebbels ( 1 897-1 945) was Nazi minister for propagand a
a n d n ational enlightenment from 1 9 3 3 a n d a member of Hitler's cabinet
council from 1 938. H e committed suicide upon Germany's defeat.
282. G.K. Ordzhonikidze ( 1 886- 1937), an organizer of the Stalin
faction, was later put in charge of heavy industry. Although he remaine d
a faithful Stalinist, t h e circumstances of h i s death are still n o t publicly
known.
283. In Russian, the polite form of address is the second p erson plural,
uy. The second person singular, ty, expresses intim acy, but also can be
used rudely to express overfamiliarity or disrespect. Adults or older people
m a y use it toward younger people, and under the old regime the nobility
used it toward peasants, servants, or any other "underlings," who were
still expected to respond in the polite mode. The distinction in English
h a s largely disappeared; the closest parallel occurs when a "superior"
addresses someone by the first name, and the " s ubordinate" replies with
the polite title "Mr." or "Mrs . " and the last name.
284. Kliment Voroshilov ( 1 881- 1969) was an early supporter of
Stalin, a member of the Politburo from 1926, and commissar of defense,
1925-40.
285. Anastas Mikoyan ( 1 895- ), an early Stalinist, was elected to
the CP Central Committee in 1 923 and to the Politburo as a candidate in
1 935. He was one of the few Old Bolsheviks to survive the purges and
m ade his career representing the Soviet government in foreign trade
negotiations .
286. "On t h e Soviet Section of the Fourth International. " New Militant,
February 1 5 , 1936, where it had the title "20,000 Oppositionists E xpelled
from the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in Recent 'Cleansing. ' ' '
Signed "L.T . "
287. Grigory Petrovsky ( 1 878-1 958), an Old Bolshevik, w a s chairman
of the Ukrainian Central Executive Committee from 1 9 1 9 to 1938 and a
deputy chairman of the CEC of the USSR. In 1 939 he disappeared from
politics and became a museum director.
288. Louis Fischer ( 1 896-1 970) was a European correspondent for the
Nation, serving chiefly in the Soviet Union, and was the author of several
books on E uropean politics. Trotsky viewed him as an apologist for the
Stalinists.
289. Filip Medved (d. 1937) was the head of the Leningrad GPU when
Kirov was assassinated. He and the other s ecret police involved were
given light prison sentences for failure to provide adequate protection to
Kirov, but in 1937 they were all shot.
290. "Bourgeois Democracy and the Fight Against Fascism . " Informa
tions Dienst, no. 10, February 1 936, where it had the title "Letter about
Hollan d . " Translated for this volume from the German by Russell Block.
In early D ecember 1935, shortly before Trotsky wrote this letter, the
French Chamber of D eputies passed a law disb anding all paramilitary
organizations. It obviously could j ust as well be used against the workers'
self-defense organizations as against the fascists, but the Stalinist and
Socialist deputies voted for it. The idea was at once picked up in Holland,
where the right-wing coalition headed by Premier Hendrik Colij n
proposed a bill outlawing all special defens e corps. Henricus Sneevliet,
secretary of the RSAP, asked Trotsky for advice, and received this letter
urging the Dutch Trotskyists to oppose the bill and supplying them with
argumeuts and even amendments to use against it. At this time Sneevliet
was a member of the lower chamber of the bicameral Dutch parliament.
He and the three CP members of parliament voted against the bill in May
1936. It passed anyway, and finally became law that September, when it
passed in the upper chamber as well. The letter was not printed in
Holland , except for short general excerpts after the bill was passed.
Hendrik Colijn ( 1869- 1 944) was Dutch premier, 1925-26 and 1 93339. His
party was the Anti-Revolutionaries (the revolution in question being the
French), a bourgeois Protestant party with some base in the workin g

c l a s s and petty bourgeoisie. Trotsky's reference to Colij n as "Father" is
tongue-in-cheek: very successful bourgeois politicians attain this title in
the Dutch bourgeois press.
291. Anton Andriaan Mussert ( 1 89 4- 1 946) was the leader of the
D utch fascist organizatio n , the National Socialist Movement, which was
founded in 1 9 3 1 . Al though Hitler n amed him the leader of the Dutch
people in December 1 9 42 , real power in Holland during the Nazi
occupation was in the h ands of the German SS. After the war Mussert
was executed for treason.
292. The NAS (National Labor Organization) was a small left-wing
trade union federation whose principal leader was Sneevliet.
293. "Stalin's Revolutionary Prisoners. " New Militant, February 1 ,

1 936, where i t was called "Tell the W orkers the Truth About Stalin's
Hounding of Revolutionists in the Soviet Union ! "
2 9 4 . Trotsky's letter to the League of N ations tribunal on terrorism,
d ated O ctober 22, 1936, is in this volume.
295. "Questions of a British Grou p . " From the archives of James P.

Cannon. By permission of the Library of Social History in New York.
This was a letter to Hugo Dewar, a former member of the British CP
expelled in August 1 93 2 as a supporter of Trotsky. He was a leader of the
majority of the Communist League (the " Groves-Dewar" group) which,
o p posing entry into the ILP, remained outside when the minority entered
and in 1 935 j oined the Labour Party, working inside its Socialist League.
In 1 936 he refused to attend the First International Conference for the
Fourth International and rejected the conference proposal for unification
of his group with the M arxist Group in the ILP and another group in the
Labour Party and its y o uth group . The three groups were not unified until
193 8 .
296. "For Entry in th e U . S . " T h e letter to C a n n o n and Shachtman i s

from Class Struggle, August 1 936 (the m agazine of Weisbord's Commu
nist League of Struggle). The letters to Muste and Weber are from an
internal bulletin of the ICL, February 1 3 , 1936, translated for this volume
from the French by Naomi Allen . In December 1 935, a split began in the
American SP, leading to the withdrawal of most of the party' s right wing,
which organized itself in 1936 as the Social D emocratic Federation. E arly
in J anuary, Cannon and Shachtman proposed that the members of the
WPUS j oin the SP, and a n ational convention was called for the end of
February to decide the question. Trotsky's letters of January 24 expressed
both his support of the entry proposal and his desire to prevent a s plit on
the p art of WPUS leaders like Muste and Weber who opposed the entry on
tactical grounds.
297. " Stalin Frame-up Mill at Work. " New Militant, February 22, 1936.
A letter to Olav Scheflo , an editor of Soerlandet, one of the papers of the

NAP.
298. William Randolph Hearst (1863- 1 95 1 ) was the publisher of a
string of right-wing newspapers noted for their sensationalism. On
January 1 9 , 1936, Hearst's papers stole the article by A. Tarov that had
appeared in the September 28 and October 1 9 , 1935, New Militant. On the
very same day, the Stalinist Sunday Worker printed a story calling
Trotsky an agent of Hearst and promising to reveal the price Hearst had
p aid for the article.
299. "A Crisis in the Workers Party . " From the archives of J ames P.
Unsigned. The WPUS had been embroiled in disputes over possible entry
into the SP almost since its formation in December 1934. It reached the
point of crisis after the Cannon-Shachtm an proposal in J anuary 1 936-
not because there was much question that C annon and Shachtman had a
m aj ority of the membership with them , but because there seemed to be a
real danger that the minority tendencies would simply refuse to j oin the
SP, thus precipitating a split. Trotsky's article was a contribution to the
preconvention discussion but it has never been published up to now.
300. La Commune , the "mass paper , " was published by a dissident
group in the GBL led by Raymond Molinier, not as the j ournal of a
tendency but as "a j o urnal of agitation where all those who struggle will
find their place . " For violating discipline by publishing their own paper,
Molinier and his followers were expelled from the GBL.
30 1 . "Letter to A.J. Muste . " From the archives of James P. Cannon. By

permission of the Library of Social History in New York. M arked "For the
Political Committee, WPUS."
302. Maurice Spector and Lyman P aine ("White"), WPUS members
who opposed entry into the SP, went to Norway to try to convince Trotsky
of their point of view.
303. "Statement to Associated Press. " New York Times, February 28,
1 936. This statement i s based in p art on an earlier version written
January 28 and published in the New Militant, February 15, 1 936, under
the title "Trotsky Cables Denial to AP on D aily Worker Lies . "
304. "Some Advice to a British Group . " From the archives of James P.
C annon . By permission of the Library of S ocial History in New York. A
letter to Hugo Dewar.
305. The Marxist Group in the ILP was the main organization of
British Trotskyists early in 1 936. It was formed from a split in the British
section of the ICL, after the maj ority refused to enter the ILP.
306. C lement Attlee ( 1 883- 1967) was the leader of the British Labour
Party from 1935 and was in Winston Churchill's cabinet, 1 940-45. I n 1 945
t h e Labour Party won t h e elections and Attlee became prime minister, a
post that he held until 1 95 1 .
Notes for Pages 254-2 78 541
307. "How to Work in the SP." From the archives of James P. Cannon.
By p ermission of the Library of Social History in New Y ork. The WPUS
national convention (February 29-March 1, 1 936), had authorized entry
into the SP, and the threat of a split over the issue was overcome j ointly.
Members at once began j oining SP branches in various cities without any
public announcement until June, when the WPUS was formally dis
solved.
308. Martin Abern ( 1 898- 1949) was a founding m ember of the
American CP and later of the Trotskyist m ovement. H e was a member of
its N ational Committee from the beginning of the CLA until he split from
the SWP in 1940 with Sh achtman.
309. Roberts was H arold R. Isaacs ( 1 9 10- ) , author of The Tragedy
of the Chinese Revolution ( 1938), to which Trotsky contributed a preface.
Subsequent editions, which Isaacs revised after he rej ected Marxism,
omitted this preface. Under the name H.F. Roberts, Isaac s was Paris
correspondent for the New Militant in 1935.
3 1 0 . "The Stalin-Howard Interview. " New Militant, April 4, 1 936. Roy

Howard ( 1 883-1964), of the big Scripps-Howard newspaper chain in the
U . S . , interviewed Stalin in Moscow on M arch 1, 1936. It attracted world
wide attention because of Stalin' s disavowal of the obj ective of world
revolution as a "comic misunderstanding. " Other aspects of the interview
are discussed in "The New Constitution of the USSR" later in this
volume.
3 1 1 . The Chinese E astern Railroad was the portion of the original
route of the Trans-Siberian Railroad that went through M anchuria to
Vladivostok. In 1935 Stalin sold it to the J apanese puppet government of
Manchukuo in an effort to ward off a Japanese attack on the Soviet
Union. The railroad came under Soviet control again during World W ar
II. The forces headed by Mao Tse-tung took over the Chinese m ainland in
1 949, but Stalin did not cede the route to the new Chinese government
until 1952.
3 1 2 . "Socialism in one country" was Stalin's theory, introduced in
the C ommunist movement for the first time in 1 924, that a socialist
society could be achieved inside the borders of a single country. Later,
when it was incorporated into the program and tactics of the Comintern,
it became the ideological cover for the abandonment of revolutionary
internationalism and was used to j ustify the conversion of the Commu
nist parties throughout the world into docile pawns of the Kremlin's
foreign policy. A comprehensive critique by Trotsky is in his 1 928 book
The Third International After Lenin (Pathfinder Press , 1 9 72).
3 1 3 . In March 1 9 3 6 , the Nazi government began the remilitarization of
the Rhineland, in defiance of the Versailles treaty. France contemplated
military intervention but no action was taken.
3 1 4 . Albert Sarraut ( 1 872- 1962) was Radical premier of France, 1933
and January-June 1936.
3 1 5 . " 'The Point of N o Return . ' ' ' New Militant, April 11, 1 936, where it
had the title "A Jingle of Lies to Please the ' Master.' ' ' Signed "Alfa."
3 1 6 . Mark Aldanov ( 1 886-1957) left Russia i n 1 9 1 6 to live in P aris and
write novels; after the Russian revolution he wrote for Miliukov's liberal
bourgeois p aper.
317. Wilhelm von Mirbach ( 1871-1918) became German ambassador
to Moscow in April 1 9 1 8 and was assassinated that July by Social
Revolutionaries who hoped the assassination would provoke war between
Germany and the USSR.
318. Anton D enikin ( 1872-1 947) was one of the military leaders of the
counterrevolution in southern Russia during the civil war.
319. " Once Again on the Soviet Section . " New Militant, May 2, 1936.
Signed "L.T."
320. Nikita Khrushchev ( 1 894- 1971) became first secretary of the
Moscow p arty organization in 1 935 and a member of the Politburo in
1939. After Stalin's death in 1 953 he became first secretary of the Central
Committee and initiated the "de-Stalinization" campaign. He was
deposed in 1 964.
321. Andrei Zhdanov ( 1 8 96-1 948), an ally of Stalin from 1923,
replaced the assassinated Kirov as secretary of the Leningrad party
committee in 1 935. He was a m ember of the Politburo, 1 939-48. He died
under mysterious circumstances.
322. "An Honest Book." New International, June 1936.
323. "The Plan to Exterminate the Bolshevik-Leninists. " New Militant,

May 1 6 , 1 936 , where it h a d the title "Stalin Plans Wholesale Persecution."
Signed "L.T."
324. "Suggestions for the B elgian Section . " Bulletin Interieur, GBL, no.
15, May 10, 1 936. Translated for this volume from the French by Jeff
White. This letter to Walter D auge was written at a time when the POB
leadership was maneuvering to manufacture a pretext for expelling the
Trotskyists of Action Socialiste Revolutionnaire from the party. The letter
achieved considerable notoriety in Belgium six months later when police
raided D auge's home, the government published excerpts, and the POB
press professed indignation at Trotsky's " a moralism" (see Trotsky's 1938
essay Their Morals and Ours [Pathfinder Press, 1973], where he
mistakenly dated the incident in 1935). At the end of May 1 936, the POB
leaders found their pretext when they wrote an electoral program praising
the van Zeeland government and calling for support to rearmament. They
demanded that Dauge, running for office on the POB slate in the
Borinage mining district, sign the program. When he refused, they wiped
him off the slate and the expulsions were under way.
325. Libaers was a leader of a pacifist oppositional group in the POB.
Godefroid was the head of the Belgian Young Socialist Guards (JGS) ,
the POB youth group .
326. Lagorgette was t h e S F I O representative at the Lille congress of
French Socialist Youth who spearheaded the attack on the Bolshevik

Leninists_
327_ " O pen Letter to a British Comrade_ " This reply to an article in the
British New Leader was circulated in mimeographed form in 1 936, in a
trans l ation from Unser Wort, May 1936_
328_ The Austrian Social Democracy, which promoted a special blend
of reformism and centri s m called Austro-Marxism, was rel atively the
strongest section of the Second International before the powerful
Austria n working class m ovement was crushed in 1934_
329. Locarno (Switzerland) was the site of a conference in 1 925 of the
main E uropean imperialist powers: France, Germany, Britain, Belgium,
and Italy_ It resulted i n a nonaggression p act known as the Locarno
treaty.
330. K arl Kilborn ( 1 885- ) was a founder of the Swedish CP who
split from the CP at the start of its ultraleft turn in 1 929, and organized
the Indepen dent Communist Party, later known as the Swedish Socialist
Party (see note 252). It was affiliated with the London Bureau before it
established ties with the Social Democracy . Lord Robert Cecil ( 1864-
1958) was a Tory MP and president of the League of Nations Union, 1923-
45. He conducted a " peace ballot" in 1 9 3 5 that polled Britons on the
popularity of war and rearmament. He w a s awarded the Nobel Peace
Prize in 1937.
331. M anuel Azana y Diaz (1 880- 1 94 0 ) , leader of the bourgeois
Republican Left, was prime minister of the S panish republican govern
ment in June 1931 and again in 1936. He was president of the republic
from May 1 936 until his r esignation in P aris in 1939.
332. " A Good Omen for Joint Work in Britain _ " From the archives of
James P _ Cannon. By p ermission of the Library of Social History in New
York. Jack was probably Jack Winnocour, a young American who
worked with Groves's group in 1936 . At this time a n umber of British
Trotskyists had left the ILP and joined the Labour Party, where they
were known as the Bolshevik-Leninist Gro u p _
333_ Witte w a s Demetrio s Giotopoulos, t h e representative of t h e Greek
section on the IS in P aris. He went to Britain in the autumn of 1 933 to
discuss the proposal that the British Trotsk yists enter the ILP. Shortly
after his return to France he came into conflict with Trotsky and
withdrew from the I C L with his group, the Archio-Marxists, which
affiliated to the London Bureau in 1 934_
334_ "The New Constitution of the U S S R . " New Militant, May 9, 1936.
335_ Christian Rakov sky ( 1 873- 1 9 4 1 ) , an early leader of the Left
Opposition, was deported to Siberia in 1 928. In 1 934 he capitulated. In
1938 h e w a s one of the m aj or defendants in the third Moscow trial, where
he was sentenced to twenty years . His letter to Valentinov, dated August
6, 1 9 2 8 , is in New International, November 1 934, under the title "Power
and the Russian Workers."
836. Sidney ( 1 859- 1 947) and B eatrice ( 1 858-1943) Webb were British
Fabian Socialists and admirers of th e Stalinist bureaucracy.
337. "In the Columns of Pravda." New Militant , May 16, 1936. Signed
"A."
:3:38. Jan E . Rudzutak ( 1 887- 1 9:38), an early partisan of S t alin, was
chairman of the CPSU's Central C o n trol Commission from 1 9:32 until he
became a victim of the third Moscow trial. V.B. Chubar ( 1 89 1 - 1 94 1 ) ,
previously chairman of the Council o f People's Commissars in the
Ukraine, was made a Central Committee member in the late twenties and
disappeared in 1938.
:339. "On Dictators and the Heights of Oslo." New International, J une
1 936.
340. The ILP's n ational conference was held in Keighley during Easter
1936. Fenner Brockway and James M axton combined to prohibit
organized factions in the party, in order to prevent the Marxist Group
from circulating Trotskyist material.
3 4 1 . Oliver Cromwell ( 1 599- 1 658), organized a parliamentary army to
overthrow King Ch arles I and assumed the title Lord Protector of the
Commonwealth .
342. " How to Win the Socialist Youth . " Het Kompas, Janu ary 23, 1952.
Translated for this volume from the Dutch by Russell Block. Het
Kompas was the internal bulletin of the Dutch section of the FI. This
was a letter to Bep Spanj er, a leader o f the wing of the Dutch youth that
remained loyal to the RSAP after the p ro-SAP split (see note 196). She
p articipated in the founding of the Leninist Youth Guard (LJG) in
O ctober 1 935 and became its international secretary. The LJG followed
S neevliet in his break with the FI movement in 1938.
343. "Political Persecution in the USSR." Documents and Analyses: I,

"On the So viet State Power: 1 934-38-Selected Contributions in Ex ile by
, "
Leon Trotsky, where it was marked " Reproduced from Controversy. "
344. F.N. Dingelstedt was a l eader of the Left Opposition i n
Leningrad. H e w a s arrested in 1 9 2 7 a n d exiled t o Siberia .
3 4 5 . Alexandra Sokolov skaya Bron stein, Trotsky's first wife and
th e mother of his two daughters, was a member of the Left O pposition. In
1 935 she too was arrested and exile d to Si beria.
346. Adolf Joffe ( 1 883-1 927) became one of the ablest Soviet diplomats
after the October Revolution. A Left Oppositionist, h e was denied
adequate medical treatment and committed suicide. At his bedside he left
a famous letter to Trotsky, partly reprinted in Leon Trotsky, the Man and
His Work (Merit Publish ers , 1 969). M aria Joffe, his widow, left the
USSR in 1975, after spending twenty-seven years in camps and in exile.
347. Victor Serge ( 1 890-1 947) was an a n archist in his youth . After the
Bolshevik revolution he moved to the Soviet Union and worked for the
Comintern. Arrested as an O p p ositionist and then freed in 1 928, he was

rearrested in 1933. Thanks to a campaign by intellectuals in France, he
was released and allowed to leave the USSR i n 1936. He soon developed
differences with the MFI and left it. He wrote several important historical
works, including The Year One of the Russian Revolution (Holt, Rinehart
& Winston, 1 972) and From Lenin to Stalin (Pathfinder Press, 1 9 73).
348. "The S p i ciest Dishes Are Still to Come." Biulleten Oppozitsii, no.
50, May 1936. Signed "L.T." Translated from the Russian by John Fairlie
for the first edition of Writings 35-36.
349. Jakob Blumkin ( 1 899-1 929) had been a Left Social Revolutionary
terrorist who became. a Communist and a GPU official . He was the first
Russian supporter of the Left O p position to visit Trotsky in exile in
Turkey. Bringing back a message from Trotsky to the O pposition, he was
betrayed to the GPU and shot in December 1929, the first Oppositionist to
b e directly executed by the Stalinists .
350. "On Comrade Ciliga's Articles . " Biulleten Oppozitsii, no. 5 1 , July
August 1936. Signed "The E ditors." Translated from the Russian by
George Saunders for the first e dition of Writings 35-36.
351. "The New Revolutionary Upsurge and the Tasks of the Fourth
International. " Theses, Resolutions, and Appeals of the First Internation
al Conference for the Fourth International, published for the IS by the
Workers Party o f C anada. The copy of the manuscript at the Trotsky
Archives at H arvard was dated July 3, but the postscript was obviously
written after the fascist uprising in Spain that began July 1 7 . This
resolution was adopted by the conference held July 29-31, 1 936, in
" Geneva" (actually, Paris) . Unsigned.
352. Colonel C asimir de l a Rocque ( 1886- 1 946) was the founder of
the Croix de feu and the Volontaires nationaux, right-wing military
formations, and i n 1 934-35 was the chief fascist candidate for dictator.
After the fascist l eagues were dissolved, he founded the fascist French
Social Party in 1 937.
353. The General Confederation of Labor (CGT) was the maj or union
federation in France, dominated b y a reformist leadership. In 1921 it s plit,
resulting in the formation of a s maller and more radical rival, the
Unitary General Confederation of Labor (CGTU) . I n 1 935 the two
federations merged.
354. Julien Racamond (1885-1966) was secretary of the CGTU, 1 9 23-
35, and then of the unified CGT, 1 935-53. He represented the CGTU at the
Limoges unification congress in 1 935.
355. In April 1 9 1 7, Lenin arrived in Russia from Switzerland and
attempted to orient the Bolshevi k Party toward taking power. This
precipitated a crisis in the party, which had been following a conciliatory
policy toward the P rovisional Government. Lenin' s call for a dictatorship
of the proletariat was at first opposed by virtually the entire Bolshevik
leadership. The July Days of 1 9 1 7 in Petrograd were a period of
spontaneous upsurge and bloody repression. The Bolsheviks were

declared responsible, their leaders arrested, and their papers shut down.
General Lavr G. Kornilov ( 1 870- 1 9 1 8) was a Siberian cossack who
became Kerensky's commander-in-chief in July 1 9 1 7 and later l e d a
counterrevolutionary putsch against him. Arrested, he escaped to lead the
counterrevolution until April 1 9 1 8 , when he was killed.
356. Jose Gil Robles y Quinones (1898 ) was the leader of the
rightist Spanish Catholic Party . H e served as minister of war i n the
Lerroux government, which suppressed the October 1 934 insurrection.
357. Before World War I , revolutionary syndicalists (militants who
relied on the trade unions instead of a political p arty to overthrow
capitalism) organized opposition to class collaborationist tendencies in
the trade unions. Trotsky wrote about the relation between communi s m
a n d syndicalism in the collection Leon Trotsky o n the Trade Unions
(Pathfinder Press, 1 976).
358. "To the Public Opinion of the Workers of the Whole World."
Theses, Resolutions, and Appeals of the First International Confe rence of
the Fourth International. Unsigned.
359. "How the Workers in Austria Should Fight Hitler. " Intercontinen
tal Press, March 6, 1 972. Unsigned. The translation from the German is
by Intercontinental Press, from Unser Wort, July and September 1 936,
where it had the title "Should the Austrian Workers Defen d the
'Independence' of Austria? (A Dialogue) . " This was the maj or political
problem facing the Austrian w orkers between 1934, when their democrat
ic rights were brutally suppressed by the Austri an ruling class, and 1 938,
when Hitler's troops marched i n and took over the country.
360. Revolutionary Socialists was the name taken by the Austri an
Social Democrats after they were outlawed by th e Dollfuss regime in 1 934.
36 1 . Jean Longuet ( 1 876-1 938), Marx's grandson, was the leader of
the pacifist minority in the S F I O in 1 9 15. He rem ained in the SFIO after
the majority affiliated to the Comintern. Arthur H enderson ( 1 863- 1 935)
was instrumental in securin g L abour Party support of the British war
policy in World War I. He was also president of the Second International.,
1925-29. The Habsburgs were the ruling family of Austria-Hungary from
the thirteenth century until the revolution of 1 9 1 8 .
362. Heinrich Bruening ( 1885-1970) was the leader o f the C atholic
Center Party. Appointed Germ an chancellor by Hindenburg in M arch
1930, he ruled by decree from July 1930 to his dismissal in M a y 1932.
363. Kurt von Schuschnigg ( 1 897- ) became chancellor of Austri a
after Dollfuss w a s assassinated i n July 1934. He suppressed t h e left while
trying to win Hitler's agreem ent to Austrian " independence. " E arly in
1938, under German pressure, he appointed three Nazis to prominent
posts in the cabinet. His attem p t to forestall annexation by Germany by
means of a plebiscite was cut short by the entry of German troops in
March 1938.
364. The Little Entente i ncluded Czechoslovakia, Rumania, and
Yugoslavia, in a defensive and economic alliance, 1 9 20-2 1 . The alliance

began to break apart in 1936 and was finished when Czechoslovaki a was
dism embered by the Munich Pact in 1 938. Its main purpose had been to
preserve the status q uo established by the treaty of Versailles against the
efforts of Germany to revise it.
365. "For Calm and Obj ective Work . " From the personal archi ves of
Albert Glotzer. Translated for this volume from the German by Russel l
Block. From Chicago, Glotzer had sent Trots ky his evaluation of how
work in the S P had fared in the first months after the entry.
366. N athan Gould, an American opponen t of entry into the SP, was
n a tional secretary of the Young Sp artacus League before its entry into
the Young People's Socialist League in 1 936, and was n ational secretary
of the YPSL when it was expelled i n 1 93 7 . In 1 940 h e left the Socialist
Workers Party with Sh achtman. Daniel Roan ( 1 88 1 - 1 9 6 1 ) was mayor of
Milwaukee, 1 9 1 6-40, and an S P right-winger.
367. "The Fourth I nternational and the Soviet Union." Theses,

Resolutions, and Appeals of the First International Conference for the
Fourth International. Unsigned.
368. "For a Common Goal in Britai n . " From the archives of James P.
Cannon. By permi s sion of the Library of Social History in New York.
This was a letter to Hugo Dewar, representing the Marxist League, one of
the three groups invited to the July 1936 i nternational conference. The
Marxist Group in the I LP and the Bolshevik-Leninist Group in the
Labour League of Youth each sent one delegate and one observer, but the
Marxist League did not. The three groups were finally reunited in 1938.
369. "The D utch Section and the International." Internal Bulletin,

SWP, no. 5, August 1 938. Signed " Crux." This letter to the Central
Committee of the RSAP was written two weeks before the ICL conference,
at a time when the RSAP leaders were still undecided about attending the
conference.
370. John Paton was secretary of the ILP, 1 927-33, and a functionary
of the London Bureau. He and P.J. Schmidt visited Trotsky in France at
the end of August 1 933 and discussed the building of a new International.
3 7 1 . A was Ken Johnson, a young C anadian j o urnalist, known
politically as Ken Alexander. He went to Norway in November 1935 with
Robertson and later wrote in Youth Militant, newspaper of the Bolshevik
Leninist Group in the Labour League of Youth, and was secretary of the
Militant Group.
372. Stien de Z e euw was Christina de Ruyter-de Zeeuw, a young
lawyer and a cofounder of the aSP's youth group. She was a prominent
member of the asp and the RSAP u n til she resigned in August 1 936 after
the Moscow trial.
373. The POUM (Workers Party of M arxist Unification) was formed in
September 1935 by a fusion of the Workers and Peasants Bloc of Joaquin
Maurin Julia 0 897- 1 973) with th e former Left Oppositionists led by

Andre s Nin ( 1 892-1937), the leader of the S p anish section of the ILO and
ICL until 1935. For a . short time Nin was minister of j ustice i n the
Catalan government, but then he was arrested by the Stalinists and
assassinated. Maurin was elected to parliament in February 1 936. When
the civil war broke out he was arrested by Franco's troops, but escaped
execution because the fas cists couldn ' t identify him. Upon his release in
1 947 h e w e n t into exile.
374. For Arkady M aslow (called Para bellum) and Dubois (Ruth
Fischer) see n otes 45 and 28, respectively.
375. The p amphlet by Nicolle Braun ( Erwin Wolf) was called
L 'Organe de masse (The Mass Paper) , with a preface by Trotsky. Braun,
who was Trotsky's secretary, used Trotsky's archives and coll aboration to
describe and analyze the crisis that wracked the French Trotskyist
organization beginning in mid- 1 935. The pamphlet is in English in The
Crisis of the French Section (1 93536) (Pathfinder Press, 1 977).
376. " I n terview on British Problems. " Internal Bulletin, M arxist

Group, 1 93 6 . The interview was with Sam Collins, a member of the
Marxist Group in the ILP. H e left the Trotskyist movement in 1 945.
377. A rthur Cooper was a member of the I LP who j oined the M arxist
Group . In 1936 he was opposed to the entry into the Labour Party and
pro posed that the Trotskyists remain in the ILP, but he was expelled l ater
that year. He remained with C . L.R. J ames outside the Labour P arty in
th e group they continued to call the " M arxist Group . " Albert M atlow
was an ILP m ember who helped found the M arxist Group in the I LP. In
the summer of 1 936 h e argued that all Britis h Trotskyists should j oin the
Labour Party. Once in the Labour Party, h o wever, he became a left Social
Democrat.
:378. After Maxton threatened to resign from the I LP over its Easter
1936 conference's decision in favor of workers' sanctions against Italy,
Brockway got a majority of the conference to accept a proposal to put the
question to the membership in a so-called plebiscite. Th e question n ai re
obscured the essential difference between the policy of workers' s anctions
and the Stalinist-reformist policy of " League of Nations sanctions"; a
narrow m ajority supported the pacifists.
379. The Lenin Club was a pro posal for maintaining a group of
British Trotskyists outside the Labo ur P arty to make public statements
on behalf o f the FI, publish openly Tro tskyist material , and at the same
time provide an altern ati ve for those who rej e cted e ntry into the Labour
Party on principle. It n ever got off the ground .
:380. C . L . R . James ( 1 90 1 - ) is t h e West I n dian author of The Black
Jaco bins and World Revolution. James became active in the British
Trotskyist m ovement in 193:') , and was the le ader of those members of the
M arxist Group who were most op posed to leaving the I LP in favor of the
Labour Party i n 19 3 6 . H e remained in the I LP after most of the Marxist
G roup had left to become the Bolshevik-Leninist Group in the Labour
Party. He and his supporters adopted the n ame "Marxist Group" for their
own use and were finally expelled from the ILP in November 1936, after
associating themselves with an "independent" monthly paper, Fight for
the Fourth International.
381. The group around Reg Groves and Hugo Dewar had o pposed
the entry into the ILP and remained outside, continuing to put out the
paper started by the Communist League, Red Flag. In 1935 they rej oined
the Labour Party, where they were in the Socialist League. In 1 935-36
they were contemplating reuniting with the other British Trotskyist
organizations, but decided against sending a representative to the First
International Conference for the Fourth International and rej ected a
m erger. In May 1937 the S o ci alist League dissolved at the request of the
Labour Party bureaucracy , and p art of its membership, like Groves, gave
up organized activity. Others j oined C.L.R. James's group, the latter-day
Marxist Group .
382. T h e Peace Councils were C P front organizations without any
mass support.
383. " Let Us Know the Fact s . " Socialist Appeal (Chicago), September
1936. This statement was dictated to a "j ournalist friend" the day after
Tass, the S o viet press agency, announced the impending trial of Zin oviev,
Kamenev, and fourteen other Bolsheviks. Trotsky and his son Leo n Sedov
were the m ain defendants, i n absentia, in this tri al. At the time, Trotsky
was in Opdagelseschef, an island, for a vacation, and had no access to
newspapers. His statement was p ublished August 17, 1 936, in Folkets
Dagblad, the Swedish Socialist Party paper.
384. Sergei Sedov (1 908- 1 937?), Trotsky's younger son, was the only
one of his children who had n o interest in politics. H e remained in Russia
when Trotsky was deported , a s a lecturer in technical subj ects until 1934.
I n 1935 he was arrested after refusing to sign a statement denouncing his
father. Unofficial reports say th at he was shot in 1 937.
385. "Open Letter to the Oslo Chief of Police . " Lutte o u u riere,
September 5, 1 936. Translated for this volume from the French by D avid
Keil. This l etter was written fro m Opdagelseschef, where the announce
ment of the Moscow trial reached Trotsky. It was here that the Oslo chief
of police, Reider Swen, came to interview Trotsky on August 13 in
connection with a fascist burglary of his Honefoss home. The fascists had
announced that their raid h a d uncovered " evidence" of Trotsky's illegal
activity in Norway. Police chief Swen left Trotsky and told the press that
he had found the fascist c h arges against Trotsky to be grou n dless.
According to Trotsky (see "In ' Socialist' Norway, " in Writings 36- 3 7) ,
m o s t o f t h e Norwegian press p ublished this letter.
386. Trotsky had been promised a transcript of the interview with
Swen .
387. One of the pieces of evidence the fascists produced was Trotsky's
article, "The French Revolution H a s Begun," p ublished in the American
Nation, July 4 , 1 936.
388. "Worse Than Dreyfus and Reichstag Cases . " New York Times,
August 20, 1936. The Dreyfus case was a frame-up against a Jewi s h
officer i n the French army accused of espion age a n d convicted during an
anti-Semitic camp aign in 1894. His conviction was overturned after Emile
Zola conducted a campaign in his defense. The Reichstag case was a
frame-up case against German Stalinists accused by the N 'L : 8 of settin g
t h e Reichstag on fi r e . They w e r e acquitted.
389. "Who Is V. Olberg?" By permission of the Harvard College

Library. Valentin O Iberg (1 907-1936) j oined the Germ an Left Opposition
in 1 930 but was expelled as a suspected agent of the GPU. H e was
sentenced to death in the Moscow trial. Trotsky l ater found a file of his
1930 correspondence with Olberg (see Writings 30) .
390. Franz Pfemfert ( 1 879- 1954) was editor of the German expression
ist j ournal Die Aktion, 191 1-32. Alexandra Ramm, his wife, translated
Trotsky' s works into German.
391. "Individual Terror and Mass Terror." Lutte o uvriere, September 5,

1936. Translated for this volume from the French b y Tom Bias.
392. Friedrich Adler ( 1 879-1960) was secretary of the Austrian Social
Democratic Party from 1 9 1 1 to 1 9 1 6 , when he assassinated the Austrian
prime minister and was thrown into prison. Freed b y the 1918 revolution,
he was a founder of the Two-and-a-Half International, which he led back
into the Second International in 1923, becoming secretary of the
amalgamated body. Trotsky ' s 1 9 1 1 article is in his pamphlet Against
Individual Terrorism (Pathfinder Press, 1974).
393. Karl von Stuergkh ( 1859-1916) was Austrian prime minister,
191 1-16.
394. "A Revolutionary, Not a Terrorist." Vangua rd (Canada) , October

1936. The interview was made for the liberal Oslo p aper Dagbladet and
published in it August 2 1 , 1936.
395. Elsewhere t h e consul i s i dentified a s Bisseniecks.
396. Konon B . Berman-Yurin ( 1 901-1936) was accused of meeting
Trotsky in Copenhagen in 1932 to get instructions from him for
ass assination plots. Berman-Y urin had been a Russi an newspaper
correspondent i n Germany. He was sentenced to death in the first
Moscow trial.
397. Ivan N. Smirnov ( 1 8 8 1 - 1 936) was expelled from the CP in 1927 as
a Left Oppositionist, but capitulated in 1929 and was reinstated in the
party. He w a s rearrested in 1933 and executed after the first Moscow trial.
398. "A Miniature E dition of the Moscow I n dictment." By permission

of the Harvard College Library. Translated for this volume fro m the
German by M aria Roth. A letter to the editors of A r beiderbladet, the chief
NAP paper.
399. "A Revealing Episode." Folkets Dagblad (Stockholm), August 26,

1936. Translated for this volume from the German by Candida

Barbarena. Apparently Trotsky wrote this letter to the editors of the
Danish newspaper Social-Demokraten (Copenhagen), which didn't print
it, and forwarded a copy of it to the Swedish Folkets Dagblad.
400. Oluf Boeggild was the representative of the Danish student
organization who organized Trotsky's lecture trip to Copenhagen in 1932.
More about this episode is in The Case of Leon Trotsky, the transcript of
testimony introduced into the Dewey Commission's hearings in April
1937.
401. "Statement on the Trial." Lutte ouvriere, September 5, 1936.

Translated for this volume from the French by David Keil.
402. Karl Radek (18851939) was expelled in 1927 from the Russian
CP for membership in the Left Opposition. He capitulated and was
reinstated but was a defendant and victim of the second Moscow trial
(1937).
403. Fritz David (1897-1936) was accused, with Berman-Yurin, of
meeting Trotsky in Copenhagen in 1932 to get instructions for terrorist
activities. He had been a member of the German CP and trade union
editor of its newspaper, Rote Fahne. He was sentenced to death in the
first Moscow trial.
404. "Tomsky's Suicide." By permission of the Harvard College

Library. Translated for this volume from the German by Maria Roth.
405. "Some Facts for the Prague Committee." Service d'Information et

de Presse pour la Quatrieme Internationale (SIP), no. 14, December 1,
1936, where it was taken from Fuer Recht und Wahrheit, the journal of
the Committee for Right and Justice in Prague, which had addressed
several questions to Trotsky about the Moscow trial. Translated for this
volume from the French by Mary Gordon.
406. Mossei Lurie was Alexander Emel, a scientist and a former
member of the German CP who wrote anti-Trotskyist articles in the
Comintern press in 1932. He and Nathan Lurie, a surgeon, were agents
provocateurs in the first Moscow trial.
407. Trotsky's letters to Olberg are in Writings 30. A detailed
discussion of Olberg's testimony at the trial and its relation to these
letters is in the Dewey Commission's report dated September 1937 and
published under the title Not Guilty (reprinted by Monad Press, 1972).
408. Ephim A. Dreitser (1894-1936), a Red Army officer during the
Russian civil war, was expelled from the party in 1927 as an Opposition
ist. He capitulated in 1928 but was sentenced to death in the first Moscow
trial.
409. G.E. Yevdokimov (1884-1936), a secretary of the Central
Committee, was removed from the secretariat in 1926 because he was a
supporter of Zinoviev, and was expelled from the Central Committee in
1927. He and Ivan Bakaev (1887-1936) were sent to prison in connection
with the Kirov assassination, then became defendants in the first
Moscow trial and were executed. V.A. Ter-Vaganian, an Armenian,

was a veteran of the civil war. He had been in exile since 1933. Sergei
Mrachkovsky (1883-1936) was a famous civil war commander who
organized the insurrection in the Urals in 1917. Expelled from the party
as an Oppositionist, he capitulated in 1929 but was exiled in 1933 and
sentenced to death in the first Moscow trial.
410. Isaak Reingold was chairman of the cotton syndicate and a
former supporter of Kamenev and the United Opposition. Richard
Pikel, a writer, playwright, and civil war veteran, had once been the
head of Zinoviev's secretariat. E.S. Goltsman (1882-1936), was accused
of meeting Leon Sedov in Copenhagen in 1932 to receive Trotsky's
"instructions" to assassinate Stalin and Voroshilov. Not only had their
alleged meeting place, the Hotel Bristol, been torn down in 1917, but
Sedov had been taking examinations in Berlin at the time, and the Soviet
government was unable to document Goltsman's entry into Denmark.
411. "Stalin Is Not Everything." SIP, no. 14, December 1, 1936.

Translated for this volume from the French by Mary Gordon. Parts of
this letter to the American publishers Simon and Schuster were published
in the New York Times, September 17, 1936.
412. "Interview in News Chronicle." News Chronicle (London), August

27, 1936. The text of the interview at the Harvard College Library
provided the correct date (August 24), to replace the date given
. in the first
edition of Writings 3536 (August 26).
413. Grigory Sokolnikov ( 1888-1939) for a short time supported the
Zinovievists on the issue of the party regime. He did not commit suicide
but was shot after the second Moscow trial.
414. "An Answer to Mr. Scharffenberg. " By permission of the Harvard

College Library. Translated for this volume from the German by Maria
Roth. Johan Scharffenberg, an NAP official, wrote in Arbeiderbladet:
"Trotsky says he can prove the accusations made against him at the
Moscow trial were false. If so, it is his moral duty immediately to go to a
Moscow court." Trotsky's reply was briefly summarized, but not quoted,
in the New York Times, August 25, 1936.
415. "The Death Sentences." Folkets Dagblad, August 25, 1936. This
statement to the Norsk Telegrambyraa (Norwegian news agency) was
partly picked up in the New York Times, August 25, 1936. The full text
was translated for this volume from the Swedish by Russell Block.
416. The Menshevik-Industrial Party "wreckers'" trials, where
the defendants confessed to sabotage of the economy, were held in 1930
and 1931. At the time, Trotsky accepted these confessions as valid (see
Writings 30-31), a view he held until shortly before the first Moscow trial
in 1936, when he inserted the following note in Biulleten Oppozitsii, no.
51, July-August 1936: "From the editors: The editors of the Biulleten must
admit that in the period of the Menshevik trial they greatly underestimat-
ed the shamelessness of Stalinist justice and therefore took too seriously

the confessions of the former Mensheviks."
4 17. "Regular Trial Demanded." By permission of the Harvard College

Library. Translated for this volume from the German by Russell Block.
This statement to the Oslo newspaper Dagbladet was printed in the
Swedish Folkets Dagblad, August 26, 1936, and was picked up in part by
the New York Times, August 26, 1936.
4 18. "A Letter to Trygve Lie." Nation, October 10, 1936. The published
letter was accompanied by the following note, signed by Erwin Wolf and
Jean van Heijenoort, Trotsky's secretaries: "At the urgent request of the
minister of justice [Lie], this letter was not published, as originally
intended. All copies were forcibly removed from Trotsky's secretaries. By
chance, one copy had already been sent abroad, giving us the
opportunity-after considerable delay-of bringing this document before
the public." Trygve Lie (1896-1968), former legal adviser to the NAP,
was Norwegian minister of justice, 1935-39, and was responsible for
arresting Trotsky and holding him incommunicado so that he couldn't
defend himself against the Moscow trial slanders. He was minister of
foreign affairs, 1941-46, and became secretary-general of the United
Nations after World War II, 1946-53.
4 19. "Trials Without End." SIP, no. 14, December 1, 1936. Translated
for this volume from the French by Mary Gordon. On the day after
Trotsky wrote this he was placed under house arrest and his secretaries
were ordered to leave the country.
420. Lydia Fotieva ( 1881-1975) was Lenin's secretary from 1918 until
his death in 1924.
421. "Letter to Mr. Puntervold." From the Archives of the Working

Class Movement, Stockholm, Sweden. Translated for this volume from
the Norwegian by Russell Block. Part of this letter, predicting another
frame-up trial, was also issued as a press release on the same day. All of
Trotsky's mail while he was under house arrest was censored and some of
it was held up without his knowledge. On September 2 he was transferred
to Sundby, where he was held virtually incommunicado, except for his
Norwegian attorney, Michael Puntervold. He was also forbidden to
write in Russian. On October 12, he wrote to Sedov in French: "Forgive
me for not being able to send you the promised article on the trial for the
next number of the Biulleten. This is "not, of course, through any lack of
desire on my part . . . but I feel confident that you yourselves will say all
that is necessary about this foul amalgam." The letter was published
without a date in Biulleten Oppozitsii, no. 5253, October 1936, the same
issue that contained Sedov's lengthy article on the Moscow trial.
422. "Echoes of a Belgian Witch-hunt." SIP, no. 11, October 2, 1936,

where it was taken from Aftenposten, September 24, 1936. Translated for
this volume from the French by Mary Gordon. In September 1936 Belgian
police raided the home of Walter Dauge in connection with a crackdown
on rumored dispatches of arms to the Spanish Loyalists. Trotsky's letter
of March 27, 1936 ("Suggestions for the Belgian Section"), was seized and
widely publicized as evidence of his subversive activity. The Norwegian
government was also glad to have it publicized at a time when it held
Trotsky under internment. He made this comment to the press through
his Norwegian attorney.
423. Spaak's visit to Trotsky was actually in 1933.
424. "Letters to an Attorney." The following six pieces are from Auocat
de Trotsky (Trotsky's Lawyer), by Gerard Rosenthal (Paris: Robert
Laffont-Opera Mundi, 1975), and are presented together for the conve
nience of the reader. Translated for this volume from the French by
Naomi Allen. Gerard Rosenthal (1903- ) was a member of the GBL
and Trotsky's French attorney. In the latter capacity he was allowed to
go to Norway in October for discussions with his client. Rosenthal left the
Trotskyist movement during the war and in 1945 joined the SFIO.
425. Hoping to use the publicity of a Norwegian courtroom to counter
the slander campaign of his accusers, Trotsky initiated a libel suit on
October 6 against a Stalinist journal, Arbeideren, and a fascist journal,
Vrit Volk, which were both echoing the Moscow accusations. On October
29, the Norwegian government passed a special law preventing him from
pursuing any litigation in Norwegian courts.
426. The International Federation of Trade Unions (IFTU),
dominated by the Social Democracy, had its headquarters in Amsterdam.
Trying to stimulate a broader public discussion of the Moscow accusa
tions, Trotsky wrote to the IFTU, asking it to take a stand. The
Norwegian authorities refused to let the letter be mailed, so Rosenthal
had to write (his letter is in SIP, no. 15-16, December 20, 1936). Trotsky's
next attempt to reach the IFTU was in the name of his Norwegian
attorney on October 22, 1936.
427. Finding himself faced with almost total isolation, Trotsky
deliberately back-dated this power of attorney and made its terms general
in order to establish the fact that Rosenthal had been his attorney and
had his authorization to carry on if Trotsky were incapacitated. "Leon
Sedov" was Trotsky's legal name as well as that of his son.
428. These are Rosenthal's notes from an interview he had with
Trotsky while visiting him to discuss the lawsuit.
429. Jan G. Adler was Trotsky's Czech attorney. SIP, no. 15/16, dated
December 20, 1936, contains the text of Adler's depositions against the
editors of Meztiskor (the successor to International Press Correspondence
in Czechoslovakia), Rude Prauo, and Rote Fahne (CP papers). The trial
was set for December 21, but the Norwegian government issued a
statement on November 11 forbidding Trotsky to make use of a foreign
tribunal to defend himself.
430. "Comments on Defense Efforts." From the archives of James P.


Translated for this volume from the French by Naomi Allen. A letter to
Leon Sedov in Paris.
431. Andrei Vyshinsky (1883-1954) was a Menshevik from 1903 until
1920. He received international notoriety as the prosecuting attorney in
the Moscow trials and then was foreign minister, 1949-53.
432. Sonne was Hugo Sonnenschein, a leader of one of the Czech
Trotskyist groups. Keller was Jan Frankel, a Czech Oppositionist from
1927, who became a member of Trotsky's secretariat and guard in 1929.
He left Trotsky's household in January 1933 to work in the IS in Paris. In
February 1934 the French police arrested him and deported him to
Czechoslovakia. In 1935 he went to Norway as Trotsky's secretary, but in
the autumn of 1935 the Norwegian police deported him, again to
Czechoslovakia. In 1937 he rejoined Trotsky, this time in Mexico. He was
the only witness besides Trotsky at the April 1937 hearings on the
Moscow trials conducted by the Dewey Commission (see The Case of Leon
Trotsky, Merit Publishers, 1969).
433. Van is Jean van Heijenoort (1912- ), who served as Trotsky's
secretary in all four countries of his last exile. He left the FI after World
War II and became a professor of philosophy. Muste's document was
his August 26, 1936, resignation from the MFI and its American section.
Muste, like P.J. Schmidt, who resigned from the Dutch section around the
same time, felt that the Moscow trial had dealt a death blow to Marxism.
434. S. Schwartz was a pen name for Leon Sedov. The two documents
are probably two chapters from Sedov's Red Book on the Moscow Trial.
For a time, Sedov was considering publishing the pamphlet under a
pseudonym, which explains why Trotsky refers to it in this manner.
435. "The Safety of the Archives." From the archives of James P.

Translated for this volume from the German by Russell Block. A letter to
Leon Sedov.
436. Natalia Sedova's telegram to Herriot requesting a visa for her
son, and Herriot's reply granting the visa are in SIP, no. 17, February 22,
1937. The purpose of locating the telegram was to demonstrate that it was
impossible for Leon Sedov to have been in Copenhagen in 1932, as was
charged in the Moscow trial.
437. Posthumus was the head of the International Institute for Social
History in Amsterdam, whose Paris branch was negotiating for the
purchase of Trotsky's archives.
438. "Letter to the IFTU." SIP, no. 13, November 4, 1936. Signed
"Michael Puntervold." Translated for this volume from the French by
Naomi Allen. After his first letter to the IFTU was intercepted by the
Central Passport Bureau, Trotsky made his second effort in the name of
his attorney. He claimed authorship of this letter in "In 'Socialist'
Norway" (see Writings 36-37).
439. "Letter to the League of Nations." SIP, no. 15/16, December 20,
1936. Signed "Michael Puntervold." The Secretariat of the League of
Nations transmitted the following reply to the letter: "No.
3A115105/15085. The Secretariat of the League of Nations is pleased to
acknowledge receipt of Mr. Michael Puntervold's communication of 22
October 1936, referring to the elaboration of a statute for an international
penal court." On March 31, 1938, Trotsky addressed a second letter on the
same subject to the League of Nations, verifying his authorship of the
first one (see Writings 3738).
440. "Letters to an Attorney." From Avocat de Trotsky. Translated for

this volume from the French by Naomi Allen. These were two letters to
Gerard Rosenthal.
441. Walter Schevenels, general secretary of the IFTU, had replied to
Rosenthal's letter on October 23 by expressing surprise that the IFTU
was being asked to examine the "Trotsky case," and saying that he
considered it to be a "purely political" matter that "had nothing to do
with" the IFTU. He counseled Rosenthal to seek any of a "considerable
number" of organizations that would be more appropriate for such a
matter.
442. Dated October 29, 1936, this "letter," actually the rough draft of a
lengthy article, became part of Trotsky's last Norwegian article,
"Shame!" Raymond Rosenmark was a lawyer used by the French
Stalinists as an apologist for the Moscow trials. He was connected with
the League for the Rights of Man.
443. The Red Book on the Moscow Trial is a translation of the
French title of Leon Sedov's book, which first appeared in Russian in
Biulleten Oppozitsii, no. 52-53, October 1936, where it had the title "The
Moscow Trial Is a Trial of October."
444. "Remarks About the Arbeiderbladet Interview." From the Ar

chives of the Working Class Movement in Stockholm. Translated for this
volume from the German by Russell Block. This letter to Haakon Meyer
was confiscated by the Passport Bureau. Haakon Meyer was a
Norwegian writer who worked with Trotsky to try to prevent the
Norwegian government from expelling him and to find another place of
exile.
445. Martin Tranmael (1879-1967) was the leader of the Norwegian
Labor Party. O. Kolbjornsen was the editor of its major newspaper,
Arbeiderbladet.
446. "On the GPU's Theft of Archives." From the Archives of the
Working Class Movement in Stockholm. Translated for this volume from
the German by Russell Block. A letter to Haakon Meyer. Trotsky's
archives were stolen from the Paris office of the International Institute of
Social History the day after they were deposited there.

this volume from the French by Naomi Allen. Letters to Gerard
Rosenthal.
448. Denis M. Pritt (1888-1972) was a British lawyer and Labour MP,
193550. An uncritical admirer of Stalin, he stated that the Moscow trial
was "an example for the world."
449. Victor Basch was the head of the League for the Rights of Man, a
French civil liberties organization that whitewashed the Moscow trials.
450. The call by a galaxy of French intellectuals for an objective and
im.partial inquiry of the Moscow trial appeared in SIP, no. 12, October 21,
1936. Additional signatories were listed in SIP, no. 15/16, December 20,
1936.
451. Andre Gide (1869-1951) was a French novelist, critic, and essayist
who became a fellow-traveler of the Stalinists in the mid-1930s but broke
with them at the end of 1936. The reference is probably to his book Retour
de l'URSS (Return from the USSR), written after the Moscow trial and
critical of the Stalinist regime.
452. Jules Romains (1885-1972) was a French novelist, poet, and
dramatist. Trotsky's remark that he is "above the conflict " is a reference
to the absence of his signature on the call for an inquiry. His name was
among those in the second issue of SIP.
453. Maurice Delepine was a highly respected attorney in the SFIO.
454. After the Norwegian government forbade Trotsky to use his rights
under Norwegian law, Trotsky sought a hearing before Swiss and Czech
tribunals. On November 11, 1936, the Royal Department of ,Justice and
Police presented Trotsky with a new decision: he was forbidden to
participate in any trial before any tribunal in any country while he was
in Norway. The rest of the notification was even more ominous. It
demanded that he immediately seek authorization to live in another
country. And it threatened to move him in the near future to a residence
that would cost the state less to maintain.
455. "Letter to the League for the Rights of Man." Cahiers des droits de
['homme, April 15, 1937. Translated for this volume from the French by
Russell Block. The League had created a commission on the subject of the
Moscow trial with the stated purpose of studying the documents, getting
the fullest possible picture of the proceedings, and writing a report. The
commission refused not only to hear Trotsky's testimony but to hear Leon
Sedov's as well. Its report, by R. Rosenmark, was an attempt to justify the
Moscow trial. This letter of Trotsky's to Victor Basch was written before
the Rosenmark report was published.

this volume from the French by Naomi Allen. These are excerpts of letters
to Gerard Rosenthal.
457. Rosenmark's report justifying the trial was published by the
League for the Rights of Man. A counterreport presented by Magdeleine

Paz, critical of the trial, was rejected.
458. Urgent efforts by Trotsky's friends to secure asylum for him in
another country finally resulted in his being granted a visa by the
Mexican government. But Norwegian officials refused to discuss
arrangements for the trip to Mexico.
459. "In Closed Court." From Les Crimes de Staline (1937). Translated
from the French for the first edition of Writings 35-36 by Ruth Schein. On
December 11, Trotsky appeared at the trial of the fascist burglars of his
Honefoss residence. Minister of Justice Lie cleared the courtroom of
spectators and reporters. The president of the court permitted Trotsky to
speak for four hours, uninterrupted, and Trotsky was so uncertain that he
would ever have a chance to state his case in public that he took
advantage of the opportunity to do so even in a closed courtroom.
460. Since the Halo-Ethiopian war did not break out until October 1935,
Trotsky could not have said this in July 1935. This is either an error in
Trotsky's recollection or an error in the translation from German to
French, from which this translation was made.
461. In 1931, the Nazis demanded a referendum to dissolve the
Prussian Landtag (parliament), which would mean ousting the Social
Democratic government of the state that had a majority of Germany's
population. The German Stalinists initially sided with the Social
Democrats against the fascists, but on orders from Moscow they abruptly
reversed their position and supported the referendum campaign. The
combined efforts of the Stalinists and the Nazis drew less than half of the
twenty-five million votes needed to ratify the plebiscite. This incident is
often referred to as the Red Referendum.
462. Major Vidkun Quisling (1887-1945) was the head of the National
Union Party, the Norwegian pro-Nazi party. He was shot after the war.
463. "For the Earliest Possible Departure from Norway." From the
Archives of the Working Class Movement in Stockholm. Translated for
this volume from the German by Russell Block. A letter to Haakon Meyer.
464. "Valuable Time Is Being Lost." From the Archives of the Working
Class Movement in Stockholm. Translated for this volume from the
German by Russell Block. A letter to Haakon Meyer.
465. "Shame!" Quatrieme Internationale, March-April 1937. Translated

from the French for the first edition of Writings 35-36 by A.L. Preston.
Some material used in "In Closed Court" is repeated here, because
Trotsky was uncertain that either of these articles would ever get into
print. This article is an expansion of one Trotsky drafted on October 29,
1936, under the title "Some Remarks on the Expertise of Mr. Pritt and
Such People," which Trotsky sent to Leon Sedov and Gerard Rosenthal.
Both copies were seized by the Norwegian Passport Bureau.
466. Joseph Fouche (1763-1820) was a member of the French National

Convention, 1792-95, and was famous for his ruthless efficiency, his
system of spies, and his political intrigue. He was exiled in 1816.
467. Antoine Fouquier-Tinville (1746-1795), a French revolutionary
politician, was public accuser before the revolutionary tribunal, 179394.
He was guillotined.
468. "A Formal Declaration." From Avocat de Trotsky. Translated for

this volume from the French by Naomi Allen. This excerpt of a letter to
Gerard Rosenthal was written the day before Trotsky and Natalia Sedova
were put aboard the tanker Ruth and shipped off to Mexico, avoiding the
usual shipping routes. The government kept the departure secret for
security reasons.
469. "Last Letter from Europe." From The Prophet Outcast, by Isaac
Deutscher. This was an excerpt from a letter to Leon Sedov.
INDEX
"A," see Johnson, Ken 387, 400, 513n; July 1 935 interview in,
Abern, Martin, 266, 54 1 n 53-57, 423, 445, 456-57, 484, 513n
Action socialiste (paper of POB left Arbeideren (Norwegian C P paper, Oslo),
wing, Belgium), 29, 42, 45, 508n, 511n 254, 256, 441
Action Socialiste Revolutionnaire (suc Arbeiter Zeitung (paper of Revolution-
cessor to Action socialiste, Belgium), ary Socialists, Austria), 349
95-97, 288, 290, 520n; ASR group, see Army: in insurrection, 136-37, 138, 346
Belgium, ICL section in Askvig (Norw_ chief of police), 468
Adler, Friedrich, 393, 395, 482, 550n Assassinations, see Kirov assassina-
Adler, Jan G_, 436, 554n tion; Stalin, attempts against; and
Adolphe, see Klement, Rudolf Terrorism
Against the Stream (Lenin), 2 9 1 n Attlee, Clement, 266, 54 On
Agents provocateurs, s e e Provocateurs Aufhaeuser, Siegfried, 38, 509n
Alcala Zamora, Niceto de, 335 August 4, 1914, 23, 84-85, 505-06n
Aldanov, Mark, 278-79, 542n Austria, 19, 2 1 , 64, 1 0 1 , 1 46, 207, 208,
"Amalgams," 22, 235, 329, 505n; see also 294-95, 345-50, 393, 395, 503-04n
Stalinist frame-ups and slanders Austrian Social Democracy, 38, 136, 345,
Amery, Leopold, 200-0 1 , 533n 503-04n; see also Red Front and
Amsterdam International, see IFTU Revolutionary Socialist Party
Amsterdam-Pleyel Committee, 26, 135, Austro-Marxism, 294-95, 543n
274, 506n Avant-garde, L' (paper of French Sta
Amsterdam secretariat (of FI move linist youth), 2 1 8
ment), 40, 510n; see also Provisional Azana y Diaz, Manuel, 2 9 7 , 335, 369,
Contact Committee 543n
Anarchists: economic theory of, 96, 1 4 1 ,
356; Spanish, 335, 337 Bakaev, Ivan, 408, 551 -52n
Anarcho-syndicalists, 96 Baldwin, Stanley, 1 64 , 1 9 9 , 528n
Angell , Norman, 200, 533n Basch, Victor, 448, 453, 454, 557n
Anglo-Russian Trade Union Unity Com- Bataille Socialiste group, 50, 208, 512n
mittee, 1 15, 522-23n Batalla, La (paper of the POUM), 369
Anti-Duehring (Engels), 1 1 0 Bauer, Erwin, 69, 72-73, 74, 159, 194,
"Antifascism," 244 5 1 6n
Anti-Imperialist League, 135, 525n Bauer, Otto, 128, 248, 294, 525n
Antonov-Ovseenko, Vladimir, 1 8 1 , 530n Bedny, Demyan, 228-29, 278-80, 537n
Anvers (Belgium), 1 90-92, 1 9 3 , 532n Beiso, Guido, 99-104
Appeal of French intellectuals against Belgium, 20, 151, 332, 334, 335-36, 364,
the Moscow trial, 448, 557n 373, 374, 432-33; entry experience in,
April Days ( 1 9 1 7, Russia), 335, 545n 43, 154-57, 191, 1 93-94, 257, 258, 259 ,
Arbeiderbladet (NAP paper, Oslo), 256, 268, 287-92, 297, 322, 323; general
560
Index 561
strike in (1893), 1 36, 138, 525-26n; 1 4 1 -42, 201-02, 203, 204, 250-51 , 264-66,
Trotskyists in, 68, 7 1 , 95-97, 1 55-57, 298, 366, 377-82; 1 926 general strike in,
1 90-92, 1 93-94, 22 1 , 287-92, 369, 517n; 1 1 5, 140, 201, 202; see also ILP;
see also Action Socialiste Revolution Labour Party; and Marxist Group
naire; POB; Spartacus group; and Brockway, Fenner, 1 4 9 , 205, 294, 295,
Vereecken 296, 319-20 , 436, 527n, 544n, 548n
Berman-Yurin, Kanan B., 398, 401-02, Bronstein, Alexandra L., 326, 544n
403, 407, 408, 419, 430, 497, 550n Bruening, Heinrich, 348, 546n
Bernstein, E duard, 159, 528n Brussels (Belgium) , 71, 322; see also
Bill, F., 436 Spartacus group and Vereecken
Birney, Earle ("E. Robertson," "R") , Bubnov, Andrei, 180, 530n
1 5 0 , 365, 527n Bukharin, Nikolai, 1 4 4 , 185, 205, 274,
Bismarck, Otto von, 108, 521n 403, 406, 531n
Bisseniecks, 550n; see also "Latvian Bulgaria, 207, 294
consul" Bund, Jewish, 47, 47n, 48, 5 1 2n
Biulleten Oppozitsii (Bulletin of the Bur, Jan, 43, 5 1 1 n
Opposition, Paris), 1 05-06, 240, 255, Bureaucracy: inevitability of, 170, 1 78 ;
256, 329, 330, 33 1 , 395-96, 407, 409, in revolutionary Marxist movement,
465-68, 493, 5 1 9n see Democratic centralism; in trade
Black Hundreds, 228 , 235, 537n union movement, 173, 202, 2 1 1 , 248,
Blanqui, Louis-August, 1 3 7 , 526n 265, 306; in USSR, 54-56, 62-63, 1 05 ,
Blum, Leon, 38, 6 1 , 63, 90, 92, 124, 135, 1 1 5-2 1 , 132, 163, 165, 1 70, 1 7 1 -79, 223-
1 64-65, 1 7 1 , 202, 248, 283, 306, 466, 25, 245-49, 255, 263, 271, 300-13, 338-
489, 5 1 On 39, 343, 344, 354-60, 393, 414, 470-7 1 ,
Blumkin, Jakob, 330, 545n 472-74, 479; struggle against, see Left
Bodrov, Mikhail, 327 Opposition
Boeggild, Oluf, 40 1 , 5 5 1 n Business secrets, 96-97
Bohemia, 6 4
Bolshevik-Leninists, see Left Opposition Cachin, Marcel, 59, 60, 63, 80, 92, 124,
Bolshevik Party, 7 1 -72, 1 66-70, 209- 10, 242, 284, 5 1 4n
370; factions in, 1 84-86, 204; history of, C adets (Constitutional Democrats, Rus
72, 2 1 2 , 235, 274-75, 276, 278-80, 289- sia) , 168-70, 370, 529n
90, 3 0 1 , 307, 362-63; Politburo of, 55, Cahiers des Droits de I'Homme, 489,
406, 5 1 3n; 4th Congress of ( 1 906), 185; 492
1 0th Congress of ( 1 9 2 1 ) , 1 84, 1 85-86, Caillaux (former president of French
204; 1 2th Congress of ( 1 923), 1 78, 425; Council), 470
1 5th Congress ( 1 929), 435; see also Canada, 209-1 0
CPSU Cannon, James P., 72, 1 82-83, 252-53,
Bonapartism: bourgeois, 61, 242-44, 310, 254, 267, 351, 507n
514n; Soviet, 1 76, 225, 236, 302, 310, Cannon-Shachtman group, 252, 257-61
480, 5 1 4n Cannon-Shachtman letter, 182-83, 262,
Bordiga, Amadeo, 102, 1 95 , 521n 530n
Bourgeois democracy, 300; and fascism, Capital (Marx), 1 1 0, 423
242-44 Cecil, Lord Robert, 295, 543n
Boycott tactic in elections, 1 99-200, 266; "Centrist Alchemy or Marxism?" 68, 74,
see also Electoral policy 112
Brandler, Heinrich, 1 46, 526n Central Passport Bureau, 422-24, 428-31 ,
Braun, Nicolle, see Wolf, Erwin 432, 435, 436, 448, 450, 456, 458, 463,
Brest-Litovsk treaty, 163, 185, 205, 2 7 1 , 466, 468-69; censorship by, 435, 438,
278, 3 4 6 , 528n 440, 446, 447, 448, 450, 469, 470; see
Briand, Aristide, 9 1 , 5 1 9n also Norwegian government
Brighton conference, see Labour Party Centrism, 33-36, 39, 152, 1 54, 159, 3 1 9 ;
Britain, 20, 62, 134-50, 243, 250-5 1 , 264- a n d Comintern, 128-29, 1 35, 142-43,
66, 293-97, 298-99, 361 ; autumn 1 935 148, 1 49; and FI movement, 24-25, 26-
elections in, 1 98-20 1 , 266; entrism in, 27, 43, 44, 50, 68, 74-76, 79, 80, 1 1 2-13,
134-50, 195, 252-53, 257-6 1 , 267-79 , 364- Communist Party (Austria), 345, 348-50
66, 369-70, 374-75; and war, 50-52, 1 28, Communist Party (Belgium), 2 1 , 58, 322
206-08; see also ILP and SAP Communist Party (Britain), 2 1 , 135, 142-
CGT (General Confederation of Labor, 43, 148, 149, 197, 198, 20 1 , 202, 203-04,
France), 333, 334, 545n 215, 296, 322, 377, 380, 381
Charleroi (Belgium), 1 90-92 , 1 93, 323 Communist Party (China), 1 1 6 , 1 23
Chartists (Britain), 136, 138, 525n Communist Party (France), 22, 38, 60,
Chen Tu-hsiu, 123, 524n 89-92, 1 26 , 127-28, 1 64-65, 218, 333,
Chiang Kai-shek, 1 1 6, 1 1 7 , 123, 523n 336, 339 , 400
Chinese E astern Railroad, 270, 271, Communist Party (Germany), 21, 38,
541n 230, 465, 558n
Chinese revolution (1 925-27), 211, 272, Communist Party (Holland), 21
523n Communist Party (Italy) , 100, 1 0 1 , 102,
Chubar, V.B., 315, 544n 104, 295
Church question, 80-83, 1 1 2 Communist Party (Norway), 217, 254,
Ciliga, Anton, 218, 226, 236, 240, 241 , 4 4 1 , 483, 491
245, 255, 263, 329.-30, Communist Party (Poland), 1 15
Citrine, Sir Walter, 1 1 5 , 1 1 7, 142, 148, Communist Party (Spain), 335
149, 1 73, 202, 248, 523n Communist Party (U.S.), 20-21
Classes and parties, 305-06, 3 1 1 Communist Youth League (USSR), 240
Clas6 Struggles i n France (Marx), 137 Conditions of the Working Class in
Clausewitz, Karl von, 140 England (Engels), 107
Cliques, defined, 296 Constitution, Soviet, see Soviet Union,
Clynes, John R., 199, 266, 533n constitution in
Coalitions, parliamentary, 85-86, 87, 89- Controversy (bulletin of the ILP), 250
90 Cooper, Arthur, 377, 548n
Colijn, Hendrik, 242,44, 538-39n Copenhagen, 440; Trotsky's 1 932 trip to,
"Collective security," 274 401-02, 408, 429, 482; Sedov's alleged
Collectivization, Soviet, 1 1 5, 1 1 7, 120, 1932 trip to, 408, 438-40, 497, 552n,
170, 246, 408, 409. 476 555n
Collins, Sam, 377, 380, 548n Councils, see Soviets
Colonial question, 41, 97, 210; and ILP, Countertrials, 436-37, 438, 444, 450-51 ,
205, 381-82; see also National question 554n , 557n
Comintern (Communist or Third Inter CPSU ( Communist Party of the Soviet
national), 19, 21-22, 39, 164, 2 1 1 , 289, Union), 22, 1 1 9 , 161-62, 208, 226, 232,
382, 465, 503n ; and centrists, 128-29, 305-06 , 358; factions in, 3 1 1 ; Politburo
135, 1 42-46, 1 47-49, 197, 1 98, 201, 202, of, 406, 4 1 4 , 478, 513n; purges in, 235-
203-04, 215, 296; on China , 1 1 6, 1 1 7 , 4 1 , 247, 255, 281-82, 285-86, 3 1 1 , 314-
2 1 1 , 2 7 0 ; factions i n , 1 84-86, 4 1 0-1 1; 16, 324-28, 329-30, 341; see also Bol
formation of, 24, 27-28, 87, 274-75, 276; shevik Party; Bureaucracy; Comin
and GPU, 217, 245; 7th C ongress of tern; and Stalinism
(1935), 22, 89-94, 105, 124-29, 130, 133, Creatures, Les (Jules Romains), 495
145, 148; and "turn" to Second Inter Cripps, Sir Stafford, 200, 298-99, 533n
national, 33, 4 1 , 92, 1 24-29, 186, 187, Crispi, Francesco, 4 1 , 510n
247, 250, 260; and war, 49-50, 58-64, 80, Critical support, 1 98-200, 20 1 ; see aLso
84-94, 132-33, 197, 201, 274-75, 336, 338 Electoral policy
Commission of inquiry into Moscow Cromwell, Oliver, 317, 544n
trial accusations, Trotsky's appeals
for, 385, 405, 436, 441-42 Dagbladet (Oslo), 401
Committee for Right and Justice Daily Herald (British Labour Party
(Prague), 407, 438, 551 n paper) , 500
Commune, see Paris Commune Daladier, Edouard, 61-62, 90, 92, 513n
Commune, La (Paris), 259, 54On Dan, Feodor, 128, 294, 525n
Communist Manifesto (Marx and En- Dauge, Walter, 58, 287, 432, 436, 513n,
gels) , 107, 159, 338, 521n 542n , 554n
Index 563
David, Fritz, 403, 407, 408, 4 1 9, 497, Edgar, see Dewar, Hugo
551n Electoral policy: of ILP, 198-20 1 , 266; of
"Declaration of Four," 19,27, 28,33, 74, revolutionary party, 200, 201
503n Eltsin, 326
Decree laws (France, 1935), 128, 520n Emancipation of Labor group, 1 09-10,
Defeatism, 80, 1 24, 129, 197-98 521n
Defense of persecuted revolutionists, Emigre Committee of the IKD, see IKD
1 23-24, 2 1 3 ; in USSR, 42-43, 122-23, Empiricism, 147
217-19,226-27,24 1 ,245-49,263,3 14-16, Engels, Frederick, 1 07- 1 1 , 1 46, 240, 259,
324-28, 329-30, 341-44 392, 52 1 n ; on general strike, 1 36-39;
De Kadt, Jaques, 33, 74, 509n letters of, to Kautsky, 108-09, 1 19-20 ,
De la Rocque, Casimir, 273, 332, 545n 136, 137
Delepine, Maurice, 449 (pic), 450, 557n England, see Britain
Delvin, Jean, 433 Entente (of 1 9 1 4-18), 88, 167, 345, 519n
De Man, Hendrik, 20, 60, 95-96, 97, 156, Entrism into Socialist parties, 44-48; in
504n Belgium,43,44,45,48,71,151,155-57,
Democratic centralism, 1 12-14, 151, 155, 191, 1 93-94, 257,258,259, 268, 287-92,
157, 158-59, 186, 187, 188, 191, 1 93, 321-22, 323, 378; in Britain, 1 4 1-42,
194, 366 201-02, 203, 204, 250-51, 264-66, 298,
Democratic Centralism group (Russia, 366, 377-82; in France, 43, 44, 45, 48,
1 920s), 185, 282, 531n 65-68, 70-73, 77, 154-55, 156, 1 86-87,
"Democratic dictatorship of the workers 191, 1 92, 193, 257, 258-59, 260, 267,
and peasants," 1 15 268,288,378, 509-10n; in Holland,321-
Democratic slogans, 82 23; in Poland, 257; in Spain, 368; in
Denikin, Anton, 279, 542n Switzerland, 48; in the U.S., 7 1 -72,
Dewar, Hugo,250-51,264-66,539n,549n; 252-53,257-6 1 ,267-69,322, 351-53 , 366,
see also Groves-Dewar group 5Un, 539n, 540n, 541n
De Wendel, 6 1 , 515n Ercoli, see Togliatti, Palmiro
Dialectical materialism, 153 Erde, see Friedberg, Karl
Dictatorship of the proletariat, 96, 146, Erfurt program, 109
300-02, 336 Erik, see Muste, A.J.
Dimitrov,Georgi,127, 1 45, 247, 275, 519- Ethiopia, 41, 50, 134, 205, 274, 317-18,
20n; and Reichstag fire trial, 230,417, 336, 359; see also Italo-Ethiopian war
550n; report by, at 7th Comintern and Sanctions
Congress, 91, 92, 126, 128, 130 Expulsions: from CPSU, see CPSU;
Dingelstedt, F.N., 326, 544n from POB, see POB; from SFIO, see
"Disarmament," 26, 38, 49, 51, 128, 274, SFIO
275, 276
Doriot,Jacques, 59, 63, 195,207-08 , 293, Factions: i n Bolshevik Party, 184-86,
5 1 4n 204, 205; in centrist or reformist
Dreitser, Ephim A., 408, 551n parties, 25-26, 43, 44-45, 65-69, 70-73,
Dreyfus case, 389, 550n 156, 186-87, 188, 252-53, 257-61, 267-69,
Dual power, 336 287-92, 298-99; in FI movement, 184,
Dubois, see Fischer, Ruth 1 87-89; in ILP, 204, 3 18-19, 378, 544n;
Dubrovinsky, I.F., 185, 531n in Stalinist movement, 184-86, 3 1 1 ; see
Duclos, Jacques, 63, 102, 162, 496, 5 1 5n also Entrism and Groupings
Dumbadze, Lado, 326 Farmer-Labor Party (U.S.), 2 1 , 504n
Dutch Institute, see International Insti "Farmer parties," 209-10
tute of Social History Farmers, 209- 1 0 ; see also Peasantry
Dzerzhinsky, Felix, 180, 4 1 1 , 530n Fascism, 9 1 , 92, 260, 335; Dutch, 372;
features of, 60, 223, 224; how to fight,
Ebert, Friedrich, 202, 533n 97, 242-44, 345-50; Stalinist approach
Eclecticism, 157, 173n to, 87-88, 91, 1 26, 130; tasks under,79-
"Economic power," 95-96 83, 112; see also Nazism and "Social
Eden, Anthony, 229, 537n fascism"
Fascist leagues, dissolution of,242,337, Front; Toulon events; and SFIO,

340,538n expels Trotskyists
Faure, Paul, 137, 1 7 1 , 526n Franco-Soviet pact, 22, 38, 60, 68, 93,
February revolution,see Russian Revo 164,272-73, 346, 349,505n,514n
lution Frankel,Jan ("Keller"),438,555n
February 6, 1934, events (France), 6 1 , Freemasonry,8 1
9 0 ,243,515n "French turn," see Entrism
Field, B.J., 1 58, 527-28n Friedberg, Karl ("Erde"), 37-38, 2 1 3-14,
Fight for the Fourth International 509n
(James group paper, Britain),549n Friends of the Soviet Union, 1 05, 1 65,
First International, 27, 143 247,249, 255, 328, 481
Fischer,Louis,240,538n Froelich,Paul, 3 1 , 32, 508-09n
Fischer, Oskar,see Schuessler, Otto Frossard, Louis-Olivier, 187,532n
Fischer, Ruth ("Dubois"), 43, 80, 1 93, Fusions with centrist parties,44,46,71,
370, 507n, 5 1 1 n 74, 1 59,5 1 ln
Five year plans (USSR), 1 05, 1 16,523n
Foreign Communists, persecution of,in Gallacher,William, 201,533n
USSR,226-27,2 4 1 ,245-49,327-28,3 4 1 Gandhi, Mohandas, 1 6 1 , 1 63, 528n
Forty-hour week, 97 GBL ( B o l s h e v i k - L eninist Group,
Fotieva, Lydia,425,553n France), 3 6 , 4 1 , 65-68, 70-73, 7 7 , 1 06,
Fouche,Joseph, 489, 492,559n 139, 1 56, 1 86-87, 1 93, 288, 297, 333,
Fouquier-Tinville,Antoine, 492, 559n 338,364, 371, 374,507n
Fourth International movement, 1 9-28, General Council (of FI movement), 40,
65, 184-89, 342-43, 458-59, 508n ; and 510n
centrist organizations,24-27,33-36,50- General strike: to end war,136-4 1 ; wave
51, 68, 74-76, 79, 80, 1 1 2-13, 1 3 4-50, of 1 936,332-33
1 95,197-98,205,206-07,364-66, 369-70, Geneva commission against terrorism,
374-75; composition of, 1 5 1 , 159, 1 84, 248,443, 498
296-97; debate over entrism in, 43-48, German Commission (of FI movement),
65-68, 70-73, 77, 1 54-57, 158-59, 189, 79-83,518n
366; International Conference for German Social Democracy, 20, 30, 59,
(July 1 936), 28, 1 9 5-96, 361, 362, 373, 81,84-85, 89,1 08-09,243,333,339,500
374, 376,478,503n,506n,547n; name Germany,85,88,1 1 2,1 1 7,123,346,463-
of,39-40,5 1 0n ; and opponent groups, 65; 1 9 1 8 revolution in, 30-3 1, 62, 1 73,
37-38, 128; sectarianism in, 65-69, 70- 333, 339, 508n; 19.33 defeat in, 2 1 1 ,
73,77-78, 152-60,1 9 1 -92,1 93-96; Soviet 526n; Trotskyists in,see IKD; see also
section of, see Left Opposition and Hitler
Soviet Union,Trotskyists in ; struggle Gestapo: alleged links of,with Trotsky,
for, 142-47, 159, 251, 265-66, 337-39, 388, 398, 404-05, 4 1 7, 426, 428, 462,
365; and USSR,58-64,88-89,1 4 1 ,1 57, 463-64, 465, 481, 491-92, 498-99 ; and
214-15, 247, 341, 354-60; see also Norwegian fascists,465, 474
Amsterdam secretariat; Entrism; Fu Gide,Andre, 448, 495,557n
sions with centrist parties; General Gil Robles y Quinones,Jose, 335, 546n
Council; International Secretariat; Glotzer,Albert, 73, 351,517n
and Open Letter Godefroid (head of POB youth),221,287,
France, 20, 21, 85, 1 35, 139, 1 72n, 208, 288, 290-9 1, 291n, 364, 542n
2 1 7-19,242, 243,273,274,283-84,381 ; Goebbels, Joseph, 230,3 1 1 , 464, 537n
decree laws in, 1 28, 520n; entry Goldenberg,Boris ("Bertrand Gilbert"),
experience in,43,44,45,48,65-68,70- 32,509n
73, 77, 154-55, 1 56, 1 86-87, 1 9 1 , 1 92, Goltsman, E.S.,408, 409, 481, 482, 496,
1 93, 257, 258-59, 260, 267, 268, 288, 497,552n
378, 509-10n; Great Revolution in,85, Gompers, Samuel, 1 73,529n
1 1 9-20,392; June 1 936 strike wave in, Gorkin,Julian, 207, 293, 534n
332-40,343,363-64,373; Trotskyists in, Gorky, Maxim, 169, 529n
see GBL: Me also Entrism; People's Gotha program, Engels on, 1 1 0
Index 565
Gottwald, Klement, 63, 515n lAG (International Labor Community),

Gould, Nathan, 351, 547n 509n; see also London Bureau
GPU (Soviet secret police), 116,245,461, ICL (International Communist League),
462, 483, 523n; and confessions, 389, see Fourth International movement
410, 413, 419, 421, 425, 430-31, 465, IFTU (International Federation of
476, 477, 481, 489, 493-98; and Kirov Trade Unions, Amsterdam Interna
assassination, 162, 387-88, 397, 429, tional), 444, 554n, 556n; letters to, 434,
471, 475, 480; and party purges, 239, 435-36, 438, 441-42
314, 328,329; and Stalinist amalgams, IKD (Internationalist Communist Party
217, 218, 255, 408, 474-75; and theft of of Germany), 79-83; Emigre Commit
Trotsky's archives, 439, 440, 447, 450, tee of, 79-83, ll2-14, 518n; and SAP,
454, 462-63, 465, 469, 471, 484 ll2-14
Great French Revolution, 85; terror in, Illegality, 43, 47, 48, 80, ll2-14, 156,205-
ll9-20, 392 06, 2ll, 265, 289, 298, 372-73, 379
Greece, 123 ILP (Independent Labour Party, Brit
Green, William, 173, 529n ain), 129, 134-50, 197-208, 250, 264,
Gromann, 419 364-66,377-82, 525n; colonial policy of,
Groupings, 188, 204, 318; see also Fac 205; and CP, 135, 142-43, 148,149,197,
tions 198, 201, 202, 203-04, 215, 296; Easter
Groves, Reg, 549n 1936 conference of, 317-20, 544n,548n;
Groves-Dewar group, 250-51,264-66,298- electoral policy of, 198-201, 266; on
99, 361, 380, 539n, 549n general strike, 136-41; groupings in,
Guesde, Jules, 85-86, 519n 204, 318-19, 378, 544n; and Labour
Party, 198-202, 203, 204, 361, 378-79;
Habsburgs, 345, 546n and London Bureau, 134, 143-44, 197,
Haile Selassie, 41, 318, 510n 293-97; Trotskyists in, see Marxist
Harte (German emigre Trotskyist), 214 Group; on new International,136,142-
Hearst, William R, 254-56, 540n 47, 195, 197-98, 205, 206-07, 319-20; on
Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich, 84, sanctions against Italy, 148, 150, 197-
519n 201, 295-96, 526-27n, 548n
Held, Walter, 486, 516n ILP Guild of Youth, 203, 533n
Henderson, Arthur, 345, 546n Imperialism, Lenin on, 87
Hennaut, A, 196, 532n Independent Labor Party (Poland), 207,
Herriot, Edouard, 62, 164, 165, 336, 440, 294, 534n
501, 515n Individual, role of in history, 171, 175-
Hindenburg, Paul von, 82, 519n 76, 177,178
History of the Russian Revolution, 180, Individual terrorism, see Terrorism, in
185 dividual
Hitler, Adolph,30,229, 274, 345-50, 392, Indochina, 123
394, 465, 466, 503n; assumption of Industrialization, Soviet, 115, ll6, 170,
power by, 19, 21, 82, 117, 173; blood 476
purge by, ll8, 524n Informations Dienst (IKD internal bul
Hoan, Daniel, 351, 547 letin), 522n
Hohenzollern, 84, 339, 345, 513n; and International commission on acts of
Bolsheviks, 59, 166, 167, 278-79 terror against revolutionary elements
Holland, 20, 74-76, 123, 321-23, 362-76, in the Soviet Union, 42-43
538-39n; fascism in, 242-44; fusion in, International commission to investigate
27, 44, 46, 159; Trotskyists in, see charges against Soviet political pris
RSAP; see also Leninist Youth Guard oners, 217-19, 227, 328, 343-44
Hotel Bristol (Copenhagen), 482, 497, International Conference for the Fourth
552n International, see Fourth Internation.
Howard, Roy,270-77,300, 301,304,541n al
Hubin, 290, 291, 291n Internationale, L' (paper of I'Union
Humanite, L' (French CP paper), 61, 99- Communiste), 158, 527n
104, 130, 162, 164, 218, 242, 400, 515n International Institute of Social History
(Amsterdam and Paris), 440, 447, 462- Klement, Rudolf ("Adolphe"), 74 , 518n
63, 462n, 555n, 556n Knudsen, Hjordis, 464
International Secretariat (of FI move Knudsen, Konrad, 53, 57, 352 (pic), 401,
ment), 38, 40, 42, 43, 67, 182-83, 190, 445, 483, 486, 500, 513n
191, 1 93, 213, 2 1 4 , 252, 298, 361, 369, Koht (Norwegian minister of foreign
442, 507n; letters to, 33-36, 37-38, 39-40, affairs), 457-58, 483
41, 42-43, 190-92, 217-19 Kolbjornsen, 0., 445, 456, 457, 556n
Isaacs, Harold R ("Roberts"), 269, 541n Kolchak, Alexander, 56, 237, 513n
Italo-Ethiopian war, 41, 50, 54, 134, 274, Kompas, Het (Dutch Trotskyist internal
317-18, 336, 359, 526-27n; see also bulletin), 544n
Sanctions Konstad (chief of Passport Bureau), 458,
Italy, 41, 88, 96, 123, 207, 273; Trotsky 468, 470
ists in, 101; see also Sanctions Kornilov, Lavr G_, 335, 546n
Izvestia, 180, 279, 280 Kosior, Stanislav, 120, 235, 524n
Krupskaya, Nadezhda, 178, 411, 530n
Jack, see Winnocour, Jack Kulaks (wealthy peasants , Russia), 237,
Jacob, B., 436 238, 281, 302, 309
Jacobins, 91, 162, 520n Kuomintang (People's Party, China),
Jacquemotte, Joseph, 58, 63, 513n 116, 523n
James , C_L.R, 380, 548-49n Kuryer Codzienny, 254-55
Japan, 54-55, 270-72
Jaures, Jean, 85, 519n
Joffe, Adolf and Maria M _ , 327, 544n Labour League of Youth (Britain), 203,
Johnson, Ken ("AU), 365, 547n 366, 373, 533n
Johre, A., 43, 511n Labour Party (Britain), 20, 62, 135, 149,
Jordaan events (1934, Holland), 74, 518n 198-200, 306, 377-82, 500, 504n; Bright
Jouhaux, Leon, 124 , 140, 173, 306, 334, on conference of (1935), 199, 533n; and
524n CP, 203, 377; entry into, 141-42, 201-02,
July days (1917, Russia), 169 , 545-46n 203, 204, 250, 366; left-wing opposition
June strike wave (1936, France), 332-40, in, 142, 202, 250, 255, 264-66, 298;
343 youth in, see Labour League of Youth;
see also Socialist League
Kaganovich, Lazar, 120, 315, 524n Lafargues, Laura and Paul , 122, 524n
Kamenev, Leon, 122, 176, 218, 263, 411, Lagorgette, 288, 542-43n
435, 513n; January 1935 trial of, 56, Lakhovitsky, 327
120, 161-62, 246, 396, 403, 477; August Lansbury, George, 148, 200-01, 381, 526n
1936 trial of, 403, 408, 410, 419-20, 481, Larin, Yuri, 72, 517n
491 Lassalle, Ferdinand, 108-09, 521n
Kampf, Der (Austro-Marxist paper), 295, "Latvian consul," 120, 162, 387, 397,
393 398, 410, 524n
Kampf und Kultur, 445 Laval, Pierre, 22, 90, 91, 124, 164, 207,
Kautsky, Karl, 108-09, 119, 136, 137-38, 229, 272, 273, 505n
469, 521n Lawsuit against Stalinist and fascist
Keller, see Frankel, Jan papers, 434, 441, 491, 554n
Kerensky, Alexander, 229, 234, 235, Leadership, role of, 27, 31-32, 113-14,
537n 166, 171-72, 173, 174, 176, 204-05, 336-
Khinchuk, Lev, 172, 529n 38, 366
Khrushchev, Nikita, 281-82, 542n League for the Rights of Man (France),
Kievlyanin (official czarist paper), 228 453, 454, 490, 492, 4 97, 557n
Kilbom, Karl, 295, 543n League of Nations, 22, 49, 134, 148, 164 ,
Kirov, Sergei: assassination of, 101, 103, 165, 199, 201, 247, 272, 274-75, 295,
120, 161-62, 394, 396-98, 520n; January 336, 415, 505n; Lenin on, 274, 277;
1935 trial on, 387, 396-98, 403; and tribunal of, on terrorism, 248, 443, 498,
GPU, 226, 255, 397, 471, 475, 479, 480, 556n; see also Sanctions against Italy
489, 492, 497-98 Lebas, Jean-Baptiste, 137, 526n
Index 567
Left Communists (Bukharinists, 1918), Lou 7.on , Robert, 218, 535n

185 Lovestoneites, 208, 534n
Left Opposition (Trotskyists), 106, 115- Lozovsky, Solomon, 145, 526n
17, 145, 148, 172, 176, 178-79, 211, 235- LSG (Bulgaria), 207, 294
41, 247-48, 342, 343, 395-96, 476-77, Lurie, M_ and N., 407, 408, 551n
495, 497-99 Luxemburg, Rosa, 29-32, 339, 500, 507-
Legien, Karl, 173 , 529n 08n
Leipart, Theodor, 173, 529n
Lenin, V _ I . , 59, 163, 164-65, 172, 225, 231- MacDonald, Jack, 507n
32, 240, 368, 426, 506n; on agrarian Maisky, Ivan, 56, 172, 513n
question, 185; and bureaucracy, 225, Makhno, Nestor, 237
425; and factions, 72, 178, 185-86, 205; Manifesto of October 17 (1905), 138,
on imperialism, 87; on League of 526n
Nations, 274, 277; in October Revolu Manuilsky, Dimitri, 145, 526n
tion, 119, 169, 363; on petty bourgeoi "March separately, strike together," 215
sie, 86-87; on Plekhanov, 110, 382; on Markin, see Sedov, Leon
Second International, 23, 30, 84-85, 93- Marteau (Belgian Stalinist), 43, 45, 71,
94; and social patriotism, 23, 84-85, 88- 511n
89, 93-94, 347-48; on state, 85-87, 301; Martin, see Leonetti
and Stalin, 110-11, 177-78, 330, 407, Martinet, Marcel, 165, 218, 528n
411, 425, 496n; testament of, 111, 177- Marx, Karl, 107-11, 146, 225, 240, 301,
78, 411, 522n; on Trotsky, 175, 291n 354, 423, 504n; relation of, to Engels,
Lenin Club (Britain), 380, 548n 108, 110-11
Leningrad Opposition, 396; see also Marx-Engels-Lenin Institute, 108-09
Zinovievists Marxist Group in the ILP, 250, 264, 265-
Leninist Youth Guard (Holland), 321, 66, 297, 298-99, 365-66, 377-82, 532-33n,
373, 544n 540n; see also ILP
Leonetti, Alfonso ("Martin"), 507n Marxist movement, organizational var
Lesoil, Leon , 71, 517n iants of, 25-26, 43, 44-48, 71-72, 184-89,
Lhuiller, 70, 258, 517n 193, 252, 257-61
Libaers, 287, 288, 290, 291, 542n Maslow, Arkady, 40, 370, 510n
Lie, Jonas, 488 Mass work, 70, 142, 149, 153, 167, 204,
Lie, Trygve, 387, 422-24, 424 (pic), 445- 289, 321-23, 368, 372, 373, 378, 382
46, 455, 456-57, 458, 469, 484, 485, 488, Matlow, Albert, 377, 548n
500, 553n Maurin Julia, Joaquin, 368-69, 548n
Liebknecht, Karl, 59, 339, 393, 395, 500, Maximalists (Italian SP), 207, 295, 534n
509n Maxton, James, 149, 197, 259, 293, 296,
Liebknecht, Wilhelm, 109, 410, 521n 317-20, 336, 527n, 544n, 548n
Lille congress (French Socialist Youth, McGovern, John, 197-98, 318, 533n
July 1935) , 521n Medved, Filip, 240, 255, 329, 388, 397,
Liquidationism, 185, 531n 419, 497, 538n
Little Entente, 349, 546-47n Mensheviks, 72, 109, 166, 167-68, 169,
Litvinov, Pavel, 21, 165, 229, 247, 248, 185, 234, 236, 282, 290, 333, 370, 517n;
273, 466, 483, 498, 504n 1931 trial of, 419, 552-53n
Lloyd George, David, 82, 317, 519n Mercier, 61, 515n
Locarno pact, 295, 543n Mexico, asylum in, 486, 488, 502, 558n
Loewenheim, Walter ("Miles"), 32, 509n Meyer, Haakon, 445, 447, 486-87, 488,
London Bureau (lAG, International 500, 556n
Bureau of Revolutionary Socialist Meztiskor (Czechoslovakia), 554n
Parties, London-Amsterdam Bureau), Mikoyan, Anastas, 232-33, 315, 538n
36, 75, 159, 195, 206-08, 213, 336-37, Miles, see Loewenheim, Walter
442, 517n; and FI movement, 149, 364- "Military center" (Russia, 1917), 180-81
65, 369, 374, 375; and ILP, 134, 143-44, Military Revolutionary Committee (Rus-
197, 293-97 sia, 1917), 180
Longuet, Jean, 345, 546n Minneapolis (U.S.), 21, 504n
Mirbach, Wilhelm von, 278, 279, 542n New Leader (ILP paper), 134, 135, 147-
Molenaar, Jan, 159, 528n 48, 149, 198, 317, 318
Molinier, Raymond, 218, 259, 288, 535n New Militant (WPUS paper), 77, 250,
Molotov, Vyacheslav, 229, 233, 300, 301 - 503n
02, 309 , 310, 311, 315, 394, 498, 523n News Chronicle (London), 41316
Mongolia, 270-72 Nicolle Braun, see Wolf, Erwin
Monopoly of foreign trade, Soviet, 96, Nieuwe Fakkel, De (RSAP paper), 364,
131 366, 369, 370, 374
Montanari, 99-104 Nikolaev, Leonid, 255, 393, 396-97, 403,
Morgenbladet (Oslo), 405 419 , 430, 475, 480, 497-98, 520n
Morrison, Herbert, 199, 200, 381, 533n Nin, Andres, 368-69, 437, 548n
Moscow trial (August 1936), 383, 387-91, 1905 revolution, see Revolution of 1905
397-421, 425-31, 435, 471-82, 489-500; Norway, 53, 57, 207, 383-85, 398, 429,
and January 1935 trial, 397-98, 419, 443; fascists in, 459, 463-65, 466, 468,
425, 429 469, 471, 474, 484, 485, 491
Mot-Dag group (Norway), 68, 195, 207, Norwegian government, 422-24, 427-31,
295, 516n 450-51, 454, 455, 468, 469, 470, 479,
Mouvement ouvrier pendant la guerre 482-83, 486-87, 488; accusations of,
(Rosmer), 283-84 against Trotsky, 388, 400, 428; de
Mrachkovsky, Sergei, 408, 552n mands declaration of T . , 423; interns
Mulhouse congress (SFIO, June 1935), T., 428-29, 442, 451, 455, 457, 553n,
66, 516n 557n; places conditions on T.'s asy
Mussert, Anton Adriaan, 244, 539n lum, 54, 386-87, 422-24, 428, 445-46,
Mussolini, Benito, 41, 50, 134, 160, 229, 456-58, 484; prevents T. from using
274, 317, 510n countertrial abroad, 450-51, 554n,
Muste, A.J., 253, 258, 262, 267, 351, 352 557n; prevents T. from using Norwe
(pic), 353, 366, 374-75, 376, 438, 507n , gian courts, 554n; and Soviet govern
555n ment, 427-28, 429 , 431 , 457, 458, 483-
Muste-Weber group, 252, 257-61 84, 491; see also Central Passport
Bureau
NAP, see Norwegian Labor Party Norwegian Labor Party (NAP), 195, 207,
Napoleon Bonaparte, 132, 392 295, 388, 401, 483, 532n
Napoleon III, 3 1 1 No voye Vremya (official czarist paper),
Narodniks (Russian populists), 1l0, 209 , 228
479, 521-22n
NAS (Dutch National Labor Organiza-
tion), 244, 372-73, 539n October Revolution, see Russian Revolu
Nation (New York), 386, 423, 428, 458 tion
Nationalization of property, 224, 225 Oehler, Hugo, 65-69, 71-73, 77-78, 79, 1 93-
National question, 185; see also Colonial 94, 257, 258, 5lln, 515n
question Olberg, Valentin, 390-91, 398, 419, 430,
Naville, Pierre, 70, 258, 259, 516n 497, 550n; Trotsky's correspondence
Nazism, 64, 81-82, 345-50, 465; see also with, 407, 551n
Fascism Old Bolsheviks, 55-56, 472, 513n
Neo-Socialists (France), 90, 91 "On the Suppressed Testament of Len
NEP (New Economic Policy, Russia), in," 178
Ill, 185, 309, 531n Open Letter for the Fourth Internation
Neue Front, Die (SAP paper), 1 28 al, 19-28, 33-36, 37, 43, 44, 67-68, 1 1 8,
Neue Zeit, Die (German Social Demo 190-91, 194, 206, 215, 251, 266, 288,
cratic paper), 108 298, 503n, 506n
New Deal, 504n Opponents work, see Fourth Interna
New International, fight for 25, 33-36, tional movement, and opponent
136, 142-47, 159, 206-07, 319-20, 333, groups
376 Ordzhonikidze, G.K., 231-32, 537n
New International (WPUS magazine), Organe de masse, I' (Wolf), 371, 548n
250 Organic unity, 23, 33, 93, 129
Index 569
OSP (Independent Socialist Party, Hol Posthumus, 400, 555n

land), 74, 519n Potemkin, Vladimir, 172, 529n
POUM (Workers Party of Marxist Unifi
Pacifism, 26, 49-52, 80, 88, 148, 150, 197- cation, Spain), 368-69
98, 200, 270, 271, 272-75, 293, 295, 3 1 8 PPS, see Socialist Party (Poland)
Paine, Lyman ("White"), 262, 268n, Prague Committee, see Committee for
540n Right and Justice
Pankratov, 326-27 Pravda, 107-11, 229, 230-3 1 , 232, 234,
Parabellum, see Maslow, Arkady 235, 237, 254-55, 278-79, 285, 314-16,
Paris Commune, 6 1 , 283, 514n; Marx 325, 34 1 -42, 425, 426, 495, 521n
and Engels on, 110, 146 Press, revolutionary: in illegal condi
"Parity of formations," 259 tions, 112; and opponents, 37-38, 40,
Parties; and classes, 305-06, 311; see also 380
Revolutionary party Principles, vs_ tactics, 1 55, 193-96, 252,
Party democracy, 186, 187, 366; see also 257, 264
Democratic centralism and Revolu Pritt, Denis M_, 448 , 450, 475, 490, 4 9 1 ,
tionary party 4 9 2 , 496, 497, 4 9 8 , 4 9 9 , 500, 557n
Parvus, A.I_, 30, 508n Problems of Leninism (Stalin), 1 73n
Paton, John, 365, 547n Proletaire d 'A vant-Garde, La, 158, 527n
Paz, Magdeleine, 218, 558n Property forms, 223-24 , 354-60
Peace Council (Britain), 38 1 , 549n Provisional Contact Committee (of FI
Peasantry, 48, 86, 96, 209-10; see also movement), 28; see also Amsterdam
Farmers Secretariat
People's Front, 33, 61-62, 126-27, 1 33, Provocateurs, 99-104, 1 20, 162, 217, 255,
370, 514-15n; in France, 81, 89-94 , 244, 396, 401, 419, 426, 429, 480, 494, 498
334, 335, 381 ; in Russia, 167-68, 370; in Puntervold, Michael, 427-31 , 434, 438,
Spain, 339-40, 369 440, 450, 488, 553n
Permanent revolution, 1 76, 529-30n Purges, see CPSU, purges in
PetIyura, Simon, 237 Pyatakov, Yuri, 185, 531n
Petty bourgeoisie, 96, 148, 271; distinc
tions within, 86-87; and fascism, 9 1 ,
334-35; lack o f independence of, 209; Que faire? (dissident French CP paper),
and religion, 81-82 157-58, 527n
Petrovsky, Grigory, 238, 538n Quisling, Vidkun, 471 , 558n
Pfemfert, Franz, 390-91, 398, 407, 440,
550n; Mrs_ , see Ramm, Alexandra "R," see Birney, Earle
Pieck, Wilhelm, 80, 5 18-19n Racamond, Julien, 334, 545n
Pikel, 408 Radek, Karl, 403, 442, 551n
Pilsudski, Jozef, 48, ll5, 512n Radicals (France), 20, 49, 61-62, 91, 128,
Pivert, Marceau, 50, 208, 288, 364, 512n 168, 172n, 244, 335, 340, 381, 504n;
Plekhanov, Georgi, llO, 218, 382, 521n bloc of, with Socialists, 85-86, 89-90,
POB (Belgian Labor Party), 43, 44, 45, 92, 290, 336; "Radicals out of People's
58, 155-57, 190, 259, 322, 369, 433, Front!" 80-81 , 370
5lln; expulsion of revolutionists from, Rakovsky, Christian, 304, 543-44n
2 2 1 , 287-92, 536n, 542n Ramm, Alexandra, 390-91, 407, 550n
Poland, 30, 44-48, 62, 123, 254; entrism Rationalism, 153
in, 257; ILP in, 207, 294, 534n Red Book on the Moscow Trials (L.
Political Bureau, see Bolshevik Party, Sedov), 439, 444, 446, 447, 448, 474-75,
Politburo of, and CPSU, Politburo of 482, 494, 497, 555n, 556n
Political revolution, in USSR, 224-25, Red Flag (paper of Groves-Dewar
359, 393 group), 380, 549n
Political strike, see General strike Red Front (Austria), 207, 208, 294-95,
Pollitt, Harry, 201 , 38 1 , 533n 534n
Ponsonby, Arthur, 200, 533n Red Referendum (Prussia), 465, 558n
Populaire, Le, 202 Reese, Maria, 230-31 , 537n
"Postcard amalgam , " 217-19, 255, 535n Regime, see Democratic centralism
Reichstag fire trial (Germany, 1933), 92, Rundschau (German CP paper), 40, 42,
230, 389, 394, 417, 550n 510n
Reingold, Isaak, 408, 426, 495, 552n Russian CP, see CPSU
Religious freedom, 80-83 Russian Revolution (1917): February
Renaudel, Pierre, 59, 513-14n revolution, 167, 169, 185, 333, 370,
Revisionism, 108, 528n 531n; April days, 335; July days, 169,
Revolution (paper of French Socialist 335, 545-46n; August coup, 335; Octo
Youth), 77, 166, 218, 518n ber revolution, 24, 166-70, 172, 174,
Revolution and counterrevolution, his 180-81 , 212, 228-29, 234, 236, 249, 282,
torical laws of, 55, 166-70, 180-81, 332, 506n; see also Revolution of 1 905
333-34, 347 Russian Revolution, The (Luxemburg),
Revolutionary Left (France), 208, 534n 31
Revolutionary party, 192, 371, 372; Russo-Japanese War, 138
democracy in, 184-89; electoral policy Ryazanov, David, 111 , 522n
of, 200; independence of, 382; need for, Rykov, Alexei, 185, 406, 531n
27, 1 66, 289, 312, 392; see also Demo
cratic centralism and Leadership
Revolutionary Socialist Party (Austria),
294, 345, 348-50, 546n Saar plebiscite, 21, 64, 505n
Revolutionary syndicalism, 337, 546n Sacred union, 62, 77, 515n
Revolution Betrayed, 438, 446, 448, 450, Safanova (Smirnov's former wife), 426
470-71, 472, 487 Sanctions against Italy, 148, 150, 197-
Revolution of 1905 (Russia), 30, 1 38, 234, 201, 202, 213, 214, 295-96, 336, 526-27n,
508n, 526n 548n; "workers' sanctions," 201 , 548n
Revolutions of 1 848, 107, 137, 521n San Francisco (U.S.), 2 1 , 504n
Rhineland , remilitarization of, 273, 274, SAP (Socialist Workers Party of Ger
54 1n many), 29, 31-32, 50, 134, 135, 1 36, 148,
Right Opposition (late 1920s, USSR), 157, 1 58-59, 208, 214, 293-97, 323, 364,
406 508n; and Comintern, 128-29, 1 45, 206;
Roberts, see Isaacs, Harold R and FI movement, 33-36, 44, 51, 68-69,
Robertson, see Birney, Earle 74-75, 215-16; and IKD, 79, 80, 1 1 2- 14,
Robespierre, Maximilien, 1 1 9, 317, 524n 213
Rolland, Romain , 161-65, 218, 247, 448, Sarraut, Albert, 273, 541n
528n Scandinavia, 20, 21
Romains, Jules, 448-50, 495, 557n Scharffenberg, Johan, 417-18, 552n
Roosevelt, Franklin D_, 20, 24, 504n Scheideman n , Philipp, 60, 86, 202, 346,
Rosenfeld, Kurt, 162, 528n 514n
Rosenmark, Raymond, 444, 448, 454, Schevenels, Walter, 444, 556n
475, 489-92, 494, 496, 497, 498, 499, Schmidt, P. J., 68, 74-76, 1 23, 365, 367,
556n, 557-58n 438, 507n
Rosenthal, Gerard, 434-37, 444, 448-52, Schneider, 61, 515n
453, 454, 449 (pic), 501, 554n Schuessler, Otto ("Oskar Fischer"), 43,
Rosmer, Alfred, 218, 283-84, 535n 511n
Rote Fahne (Austrian CP paper), 348 Schuschnigg, Kurt von , 348, 546n
Rote Fahne (Czech CP paper), 554n Schwab, Jim ("Walcher"), 32, 195, 207,
Rothschild, 6 1 , 515n 293-94, 295, 509n
Rous, Jean, 101, 520n Schwartz, So, see Sedov, L.
Roy, M_N_, 124, 524n Second International, 19, 20, 27, 33, 39,
RSAP (Revolutionary Socialist Workers 143, 145, 186, 206, 246-47, 259, 442,
Party, Holland), 27, 37, 46, 68, 70, 74- 503n; August 4, 1914, betrayal by, 23,
76, 134, 159, 193, 195, 1 97, 206, 213, 84-85, 505-06n; and war, 49-50, 59-60,
296-97, 362-76, 507n; see also Leninist 62, 87, 92
Youth Guard Sectarianism, 211; accusations of,
Rude Prav o (Czech CP paper), 554n against Bolsheviks, 155, 157, 166-67,
Rudzutak, Jan E., 315, 544n 169; in FI movement, 65-69, 70-73, 77-
Rumania, 206-07, 294 78, 152-60, 155, 157, 158-59, 184, 191-
Index 571
92, 1 93, 1 9 4 ; paves way for opportun Socialist Party (France) see SFIO
ism, 67, 68-69, 145, 154, 158; of Socialist Party (Germany) see German
Stalinists, see "Third period " Social Democracy
Sects; defined, 296 Socialist Party (Italy), 207, 295, 534n
Sedov, Leon (" Markin," "Schwartz "), Socialist Party (Poland, PPS), 46-47, 48,
222, 399, 434, 447, 453, 462, 462n, 474- 512n
75, 50 1 , 502, 536n, 555n; accusations Socialist Party (Spain), 3 3 5
against, 404, 409, 413, 427, 442, 482; Socialist Party (Sweden) , 207, 2 9 5 , 534n
and alleged trip to Copenhagen, 408, Socialist Party (U.S.), 7 1 -72, 252, 253,
438-39, 440, 444, 474-75, 497, 552n, 257-6 1 , 267-69, 351, 539n
555n "Socialist United States of Europe," 26,
Sedov, Sergei, 385, 398-99, 502, 549n 49, 97, 272
Sed ova, Natalia, 440, 45 1 , 486-87, 500, Socialist Youth (France), 66, 68, 77, 179
501, 555n Socialist Youth (Spain), 69, 368, 373
Separation of church and state, 82 Social patriotism, 38, 50, 58-64, 84-94,
Serge, Victor, 327, 446, 448 124, 129, 134, 157, 167-70, 1 97, 200,
Seventh Congress, see C omintern, 7th 203, 246, 345-50
Congress of Social revolution, vs. politi c al revolu
SFIO (French SP), 20, 38, 45, 65-68, 70- tion, 224-25, 358-59
73, 9 1 , 128, 1 86-87, 208, 258, 259, 333, Social Revolutionary Party (Russia),
336, 339, 5 1 0n ; bloc of, with Radicals, 166, 1 6 7-68, 169, 169n, 205, 236, 278,
85-86, 89-90, 92, 290, 336; expels 282, 302, 333, 370, 479, 529n; 1922 trial
Trotskyists, 68, 77, 106, 1 8 7 , 259, 521n of, 162
Shachtman, Max, 72, 182-83, 252, 353, Sokolnikov, Grigory, 413, 420, 552n
366, 367, 374-75, 376, 5 1 7n ; see also Solntsev, E.B., 326
Cannon-Shachtman group Sonnenschein, Hugo ("Sonne"), 438,
"Single reactionary mass" (Lassalle), 555n
1 08-09, 521n Souvarine, Boris, 218, 535n
SIP (Informational Press Service of IS), Soviet revolutionists, defense of, see
222, 536n Defense of persecuted revolutionists
Sixteen Executed in Moscow (Serge), Soviets, 1 46-47, 1 99-200, 202, 215; in
446, 448 Russia, 166, 167, 170, 290, 300, 302,
Skujeneck, see "Latvian consul" 303, 3 1 0 , 336, 338, 340, 357, 370
Smerdyakov, 1 80-81, 530n Soviet Union, 222, 230-34, 300-13; class
Smirnov, Ivan N., 399, 408, 409, 426, character of, 214-15, 223-25, 302-03,
481 , 493, 496, 550n 331 , 360; collectivization in, 1 1 5, 1 1 7,
Sneevliet, Henricus , 123, 367, 368, 371, 120, 170; defense of, 58-64, 88-89, 1 4 1 ,
374, 507n 157, 2 1 4-15, 247, 341, 359-60, 416;
Social Credit Party (Canada), 209, 535n economy of, 56, 130-33, 1 70 , 223-25,
Social Democracy, 1 98-99; see also 282; in the Far East, 54-55, 270-72;
German Social Democracy and Sec industrialization in, 115, 116, 1 70;
ond International n ational chauvinism i n , 228-29; new
Social Democratic youth, 3 21-23, 368, constitution in, 300-1 3 , 324, 3 4 1 , 357-
373 58, 4 1 4 ; political parties in, 305-06,
Social-Demokraten (Copenhagen), 401 3 1 1 ; repression in, 1 1 5- 2 1 , 1 22-23, 132,
"Social fascism," 90, 92, 1 6 5 163, 165, 226-27, 235-4 1 , 245-49, 281-82,
Socialism, criteria for, 56, 1 30-33, 223-25, 285-86, 3 1 4-16, 324-28, 329-30, 341-44;
312, 354 " socialism" in, 105, 1 2 1 , 1 30-33, 354,
"Socialism in a single country," 272, 355; suffrage in, 300- 0 1 , 303, 310-1 1 ,
276, 541n; consequences of, 129, 1 35- 325; Trotskyists i n , 1 0 6 , 1 1 5- 1 7 , 145,
36, 143-44, 148 148, 163, 1 72, 176, 1 78-79, 235-41 , 255,
Socialist League (in British Labour 279, 281-82, 285-86, 296, 3 1 1 , 342, 343,
Party), 202, 298-99, 533n 395-96, 430, 495, 497, 498-99
Socialist Party (Austria), see Austrian Spaak, Paul-Henri, 20, 97, 156, 432, 439,
Social Democracy 504n
Socialist Party (Belgium), see POB Spain , 19, 2 1 , 101, 123, 146, 3 3 4 , 335, 392,
504n; civil war in, 340, 415-16, 432-33, Sund (Norwegian public prosecutor), 459
459; July days (1936) of, 339-40; Sundby (Norway), 468, 485, 553n
Trotskyists in, 297, 322, 368 Surits, Jacob, 172, 529n
Spanjer, Bep, 544n Sverchkov, 234
Spartacus (French centrist paper), 29, Sverdlov, Yakov , 1 80, 530n
135, 139, 508n Swabeck, Arne, 65, 515n
Spartacus group (Vereecken
group, Swedish Socialist Party, see Socialist
Belgium), 154, 155, 184, 189, 191, 194, Party (Sweden)
322 Swen, Reider (chief of Oslo police), 386
Spartacus Youth League (U.S.), 68, 259, 88, 549n
373 Switzerland, 20, 48, 43637, 444
Special information service, see Fourth Syndicalists, 96, 337
International movement, and oppo
nent groups
Spector, Maurice, 262, 267, 268n, 507n, Tactics, vs. principles, 155, 19396, 252,
541n 257, 264
Spontaneism, 3032 Tarov, A., 115-18, 218 , 236, 249, 254, 255,
Stakhanovite movement, 222, 23132, 263, 522n
282, 536n Tass, report of, charging Trotsky, 383,
Stalin, Joseph, 22, 124, 145, 229, 23233, 387, 401
472, 480, 490, 497, 505n; on agrarian Temps, Le (Paris), 301, 311
question, 185; "assassination at Terrorism: accusations of, made against
tempts" on, 330, 390, 394, 399, 407; dissidents, 217, 219, 246, 263, 30102,
historical role of, 119, 120, 171-79 , 180 342, 343, 383, 387, 388, 40304, 406,
81, 280, 410-12; interviewed by How 412, 477, 498-99; accusations of, made
ard, 27077, 300, 301, 304, 498; and against Trotsky, 383, 394, 39599, 403-
Lenin, 42526; on state, classes, par 05, 417, 421, 425, 426, 427-31 , 441, 479-
ties, 301, 30506, 311; as theoretician, 82, 49899; directed against dissidents
154, 272-77, 30506; on Trotsky, 16364, in USSR, 42, 102, 105, 11521 , 123, 161,
478-79 163, 302, 358; Geneva commission
Stalinism, 84-94, 12529, 219, 30013, 412; against, 248, 443, 498; in Great French
on agrarian question, 20910; and Revolution, 119-20; by individuals,
fascism, 242, 24344; origins of, 171-79, 1 20, 1 2 1 , 165, 24041, 248, 302, 358,
412; repression by, in USSR, 115-21, 383, 39294, 39599, 412, 417, 421, 427,
122-23, 132, 163, 165, 22627, 23541 , 462, 469, 475; by kulaks, 302; revolu
24549, 281-82, 285-86, 314-16, 32428, tionary, 1 1 9, 162-63, 248, 392; by
32930, 33839, 34144; and Social Social Revolutionaries, 302
Democratic youth, 322, 368, 373; Terrorism and Communism, 469
slanders, frame-ups, and amalgams Ter-Vaganian, V . A . , 408, 552n
by, 99104, 106, 117, 120, 162, 163, 180- Thadder, 436
81, 217-19, 25456, 535n, 540n; see also Theory: anarchist, 95; centrist, 144, 147,
Comintern and Moscow trial 154 ; Marxist, 85-87, 152; reformist, 85
Stalinist Bureaucracy and the Assassi 86; Stalinist, 58, 87, 93, 127-28, 130-33,
nation of Kirov, The, 162, 218, 480, 498 144-45, 173n, 1 74
Stamm, Thomas, 72, 517n Thermidor, 1 17, 119, 163, 176, 177, 214,
State capitalism, 223 523n
State, 95-96, 146, 301, 302, 317; under Third International, see Comintern
fascism, 8182; and fight against "Third period," 2 1 , 90, 94, 127, 128, 144,
fascism, 242-44; Lenin on, 8587, 301 ; 145, 172n, 289, 315, 465, 505n, 527n
under socialism, 354, 357-58 Thorez, Maurice, 63, 92, 496, 515n
"Statism," 334, 356 Togliatti, Palmiro ( " Ercoli"), 126, 128,
Stephen, Campbell, 197, 533n 525n
Stien de Zeeuw, 367, 547n Toledo (U.S.), 21, 504n
Stockholm-Oslo Youth Bureau, 68, 69, Tomsky, Mikhail, 115, 523n; suicide of,
516n 406, 413, 420, 441
Stuergkh, Karl von, 393, 395, 550n Torgler, Ernst, 230-31 , 417, 537n
Index 573
Tories (Britain), 1 98, 200, 255, 533n Vandervelde, Emile, 20, 60, 97, 156 , 162,
Toulon events ( 1 935, France), 77, 92, 248, 287, 2 9 1 n , 306, q04n
127, 139, 520n Vanguard (paper of Workers Party of
Trade unions: bureaucracy in , 173, 202, Canada), 534n
211, 248, 265, 306; importance of Van Heij enoort, Jean ("Van"), 438, 458,
working in, 142, 202, 205-06, 288-90, 555n
321-23, 334, 338, 361, 372-74, 378 Vereecken, Georges, 45, 68, 7 1 , 1 5 1 , 154-
Tranmael, M artin , 445, 456, 457, 556n 57, 189, 1 90-92, 1 93-96, 22 1 , 322, 5 1 1 -
Treint, Albert, 59, 215, 5 1 4n 12n
Trial of the sixteen , see Moscow trial Verite, La (paper of French Trotskyists),
Trotsky: accusations against, by fas- 66, 1 58
cists, 459, 4 9 1 ; accusations against, by Verite group, see GBL
Norwegian government, 388; accusa Versailles treaty, 49, 61, 87, 345, 5 1 2n
tions against, by Stalinists, 120, 2 1 7 , Voroshilov, Kliment, 232, 233, 3 1 5 , 399,
254-56, 278-80, 3 2 9 , 383, 396-99, 403-05, 538n
407, 413, 4 1 7- 1 8 , 421, 425, 427-3 1 , 442, Vorwaerts ( German Social Democratic
478, 479-82; archives of, 439, 440, 447, paper), 84-85
450, 454, 462-63, 469, 555n, 556n; Vrit Volk (Norwegian fascist paper),
internment of, 427-28, 429, 431, 4 5 1 , 441, 491 , 554n
457, 4 5 8 , 4 8 3 , 484, 485; last exile of, 5 3 , Vyshinsky, Andrei, 438, 474, 489, 555n
5 5 , 1 0 6 , 3 3 0 , 386-87, 395, 407-08; a n d
lawsuit against fascist a n d Stalinist
papers, 434, 4 4 1 , 491, 554n; loss of "W," see Weiss , Wolf
power by, 1 7 1 -79, 412; and search for Walcher, see Schwab, Jim
alternative asylum, 451 , 452, 454, 486- Wal-Wal, 1 8 7 , 532n
87, 488 War and the Fourth International, 52,

Trotskyist movement, see Fourth Inter 359-60, 512-13n
national movement War danger, 26, 80, 126, 186, 1 8 7 , 260,
Trotz Alledem (paper of Swiss Trotsky 272; and general strike, 1 36-4 1 ; h o w to
ists), 48 struggle against, 26, 49-52, 58-64, 84-
Troyanovsky, Alexander, 1 72, 529n 94, 97, 132-33, 1 97-208, 293, 336, 359-60
Two-and-a-Half International, 24, 506n Wassermann, O scar, 32

Webbs, Beatrice and Sidney, 3 1 0 , 544n
Weber, Jack, 73, 253, 5 1 7n; see also
Ukraine, 271 Muste-Weber group
Ultraleftism, of Comintern, see "Third Weimar democracy, 1 37-38, 526n
period" Weisbord, Albert, 158, 528n
United front, 2 1 , 23, 90, 93, 1 67-68, 2 1 5 , Weiss, Wolf ("W"), 212, 535n
260, 465 Wels, Otto, 38, 60, 346, 509n
"United front against war and fas "White," see Paine, Lyman
cism ," 126, 246-47 White Guards , 163, 237, 238, 248, 279,
United States, 20-2 1 , 24, 27, 44, 46, 1 5 8 , 28 1 , 285, 302, 475, 528n
1 5 9 , 2 4 3 ; entry experience in, 252-53, Whither France ? 432
257-6 1 , 267-69; see also Workers Party Wilkinson, Ellen, 149, 527n
of the United StateR Winnocour, Jack, 298, 543n
" Unity committees" (Britain), 203-04 Witte (Demetrios Giotopoulos), 298, 543n
Unser Wort (paper of IKD), 1 1 2, 2 1 2 , Wolf, Erwin ( "Nicolle Braun, " "Wo _ " ) ,
214, 522n 37-38, 43, 80, 1 13, 214, 3 2 3 , 3 7 1 , 458,
Urbahns, Hugo, 223, 536n 467 (pic), 509n, 5Un, 548n
Uritsky, Moisei, 1 8 0 , 530n Women, 97, 2 1 0
Uruguay, 228-29 Workers a n d Peasants Bloc (Spain), 206,
USP (Rumania), 206-07, 294 534n
USSR, see Soviet Union Workers' and peasants' control, 9 7 , 338
Workers' and peasants' government,
Vaillant-Couturier, Paul, 58, 5 1 3 n 338, 370; see also Dictatorship of the
V a n , see V a n H eij enoort proletariat
Workers ' militia, 97, 219, 243, 244, 3 2 1 , Young Pioneers , 1 8 1 , 530n
3 3 8 , 465 Young Socialist Guards (Belgium), 71
Workers' Opposition (Russia, 1920s), Young Spartacus (Spartacus Youth
185, 282 League's paper), 77, 512n
Workers Party of the United States, 2 1 ,
2 7 , 43, 4 6 , 1 5 9 , 2 1 3 , 297, 322; C ontrol Zamora, see Alcala Zamora
C ommission in, 72, 517n; factional Zaslavsky, David, 1 10- 1 1 , 426, 522n
strife in, 65-69, 70-73, 77-78, 182-83, Zasulich, Vera, 1 1 0 , 522n
1 93-94, 252-53 , 257-6 1 , 262, 267, 5 1 1 n , Zeller, Fred , 66, 166, 1 7 1 , 2 1 7- 1 9 , 255,
539n, 540n, 5 4 1 n ; June 1935 plenum 516n
of, 65, 515-16n; youth of, see Sparta cus Zhdanov, Andrei, 120, 28182, 393, 524n,
Youth League; see also Entrism into 542n
Socialist parties Zimmerwald conference (1915), 23-24,
"Workers State, Thermidor and Bona 36, 284, 506n
partism," 214 Zinoviev, Gregory, 1 22, 276, 218, 263,
World Committee for Peace, 293-94 435, 438, 5 1 1n; and struggle against
"World Party of Social Revolution , " 39- Left Opposition , 177; 1932 "death " of,
40, 510n 401-02; January 1935 trial of, 42, 56,
"Wrangel officer," 120, 524n 120, 145, 16 1-62, 246, 329, 396, 403,
419, 477; August 1 936 trial of, 403, 408,
Yagoda, Henry, 1 6 2 , 218, 226, 240, 246, 410, 419-20, 481, 491
255, 315, 329, 330, 406, 490, 497, 528n Zinovievists: European, 212-13, 214;
Yakovin, 326 Soviet, 235-4 1 , 2 8 1 , 282, 285, 3 4 2 , 343,
Yaroslavsky, Emelyan, 185, 531n 344, 408, 497
Yenukidze, Abel, 42, 120, 511n Zukhanov, 4 1 9-20
Yevdokimov, G.E., 409, 551 -52n Zyromsky, Jean, 50, 63, 128, 1 46 , 1 8 7 ,
Young Lenin, 54, 387, 4 1 0 208, 294, 5 1 2 n
OTHER WRITINGS OF 1935-36
In addition t o the material i n the present volume, the following

writings of Trotsky while he was in Norway have been published:
Trotsky's Diary in Exile, 1 9 3 5 . 1 958, with a new introduc
tion by Jean van Heij enoort in the second edition, 1 976. Includes
ten entries written b etween June 17 and September 8 , 1935.
The Crisis of the French Section ( 1 935-36). 1 977. Includes
sixty letters and articles written between July 1935 and July
1936.
Leon Trotsky on China. 1976. Includes "Discussions with
Harold R. Isaacs " (August 8-13, 1935).
Portraits, Political and Personal. 1977. Includes "Engels's
Letters to Kautsky" (October 1 5 , 1 935) and "Edouard Herriot,
Politician of the Golden Mean" (November 7, 1935).
Leon Trotsky on France. 1977. Includes " C ommittees of
Action, Not the People's Front" (November 26, 1 935) and "Before
the Second Stage" (July 9, 1936), in addition to the full text of the
1936 book Whither Fra nce ? which includes "France at the
Turning Point" (March 28, 1 936), "The Decisive Stage" (June 5,
1 936), and "The French Revolution Has Begun " (June 9, 1936).
The Spanish Revolution (193 1 -39). 1973. Includes "The
Treachery of the POUM" (January 23, 1936), "Tasks of the
Fourth International in Spain" (April 1 2 , 1936), "Is a Rapproche
ment with Nin Possible?" I and II (June 3 and 5, 1 936), "The
POUM and the Popular Front" (July 16, 1936), "The Popular
Front in Civil War" (July 1936), "Letter to the International
Secretariat" (July 27, 1 936), "The Reactionary Cowardice of the
Popular Front" (July 30, 1936), "The Lesson of Spain" (July 30,
1 936), "Letter to Jean Rous " (August 16, 1 936), and "For
Collaboration in C atalonia" (August 18, 1936).
The Revolution Betrayed. 1937. Subtitled "What Is the
Soviet Union and Where Is It Going?" this maj or analysis of
Stalinism was completed just before the Zinoviev-Kamenev trial
in August 1 936.
Leon Trotsky on Literature and Art. 1 97 1 . Includes
"Maxim Gorky" (July 9, 1 936).

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UlRITinGS OF

in twelve volumes, of pamphlets, articles,

letters, and interviews written during

Trotsky's third and final exile (1929-40).

They include many articles translated into

English for the first time. They do not

include the books and pamphlets from

this period that are permanently in print,

nor most of the unpublished material in

the Trotsky Archives at Harvard Uni

versity Library. Five of the volumes cover

Trotsky's residence in Turkey (1929,

1930, 1930-31, 1932, 1932-33); two in

France (1933-34, 1934-35); one in Nor

way (1935-36); and four in Mexico (1936-

37, 1937-38, 1938-39, 1939-40).

PATHFINDER PRESS, INC.

Copyright 1970 and 1977 by Pathfinder Press, Inc.

E dited by Naomi Allen and George Breitman

First edition, 1970

Pathfinder Press, Inc.

* Published here in English for the first time.

the ultraleft policies proclaimed and practiced by the Stalinized

Party of the U.S. would enter the American Socialist P arty in

conditions that prevailed in the prisons, camps, and places of

Trotsky's French lawyer, which are grouped together for the

Spring-Trotsky writes Open Letter for the Fourth International.

January 24-Trotsky approves proposal for U.S. Trotskyists to

May 26-Massive strike wave begins in France.

To All Revolutionary Working Class

Hitler's assumption o f power, which did not meet with the

by the solemn declarations of Litvinov, who in return for the

its function as a brake upon the proletarian revolution. Rejecting

Meanwhile, the destructive forces of capitalism continue their

the task of the socialist revolution imperiously on the agenda.

The betrayal of the cause of the international revolution by the

ian revolution was rejected even by the majority of the

beforehand to ignominious bankruptcy those unifications which

centrism drawn. Whoever dares not utter aloud the revolutionary

proletarian revolution, but it found itself ground between the

We herewith append the "Declaration of Four" on the Fourth

June 24, 1935

Efforts are now being made in France and elsewhere to

There is no gainsaying that Rosa Luxemburg passionately

November 1918 , she began the arduous l abor of assembling the

hardly prevent the pupils of a Miles (the precious author of the

To the International Secretariat

totally harmless organizational step. Fundamentally this is not

when considering a turn of our own, and something quite the

any-to us. Through waiting and endless negotiations we only

P.S.-The latest slogan of the SAP "for a new Zimmerwald"

To the International Secretariat

informative descriptions of the internal processes in the Comin

T o the International Secretariat

Published July 17, 1 9 3 5

T o the International Secretariat

Far too little attention is paid to the Italo-Ethiopian conflict by

To the International Secretariat

This is only an approximate indication of the contents. The

T o the Polish Bolshevik-Leninists

which was imposed on u s by the total situation; whoever isolates

It is wrong to claim that we should not enter a Social

Some comrades appear dismayed, even discouraged , by the fact